


Silent Humanity

by ShadowedAuthor



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Naruto
Genre: Crossover, Gaara in Hogwarts, Gen, Mute!Gaara, Sirius' bad influence, Tanuki!Gaara, Trapped in another world, full moon shenanigans, trying to get home
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-19
Updated: 2018-03-19
Packaged: 2019-04-04 19:42:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 314,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14027385
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShadowedAuthor/pseuds/ShadowedAuthor
Summary: After a surprise attack, Sabaku no Gaara is sent to a strange new world, injured and alone. Read as Gaara tries to survive whilst keeping his 'inner demons' at bay and endeavors to find a way home.





	1. A New World

**Author's Note:**

> Cross-posted from another site. This fic is finished but the sequel is ongoing.

A/N: I started this story in 2010 and have done minimal editing of the beginning since. I hope those of you who are interested will be able to get past the first couple of chapters to where I got a little better.

 

 

The above coverart was donated by the amazing and generous Darkling221 (a few years ago).

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Sabaku no Gaara had been having a bad day. That, in itself, was not an unusual occurrence, but it had been quite some time since he'd had a day quite as disconcerting as this one. It had been a few months since his fight with the Shitenshonin from the Takumi Village and Naruto had left for his training mission with one of the legendary Sannin. Ever since his fateful encounter with Seimei, Shukaku had been almost completely dormant inside of him, except for the occasional headache on a full moon. He hadn't even killed any of his fellow Suna citizens in a while. He had also been sleeping more often, which was a big plus. Overall, things had been going fairly well.

Things _had_ been going well, until his past came back to bite him.

The past, in this instance, was in the form of a low-ranking Jounin from his own village, or to be more precise, this particular ninja's son. Several years prior to the Chunin exam and subsequent war, Gaara had been tormented by his 'inner demons' one night and had struck out at the first person he saw. That person just so happened to be the Gennin son of the man currently attacking him.

As soon as Gaara had seen the Genin boy, he had called his deadly sand and crushed the boy without hesitation. To this day, Gaara regretted taking that boy's life, along with every other victim he had mercilessly and needlessly slaughtered, but that did not mean that when a kunai appeared to fly out of nowhere he didn't block it with his sand. Nor did he allow the exploding tag on the end of the kunai to burn him. Gaara hated what he had done, but a certain blonde Jinchūriki had taught him to become a better person so that he could protect those precious to him. With that in mind, the tormented red-head parried another kunai strike from the unknown assailant, who appeared to be, from the look of his uniform, from Gaara's very own village.

The sand-user jumped back to put some distance between him and the unknown masked Suna shinobi, to plan his next move. He had been under the impression that his village had stopped trying to kill him; then again, this assassin didn't come as that much of a surprise given his blood splattered past and high rates of vendetta placed against him.

"What are you doing?" Gaara demanded in his usual straight-to-the-point way, silently planning his route of escape or plan of attack. Both would have been easier if they weren't currently in a valley, several miles from any possible back-up.

"Avenging my son! I'm gonna kill you... You monster!" This time, the infuriated ninja formed several hand seals before several loose pebbles and rocks rose into the air in front of him before flying straight for Gaara at bullet-like speeds.

Unconsciously, Gaara's sand protected him just in time, but whilst the wall of sand obscured his view, the Jounin in front of him dove to the side, to the valley's wall and jumped off of it, throwing a weapon at the person he had sworn vengeance upon. If it had been anyone weaker than a Jounin, then the shuriken that had flown out the man's hand would not have even come close to Gaara, but the multi-bladed weapon came so close to him that he had to use most of his sand as a precaution to stop the blade from reaching his neck.

Unfortunately for the current defender, this was only a distraction for the assailant to finish setting up his seal. Gaara's attention was only drawn to the circular array at his feet that he had been lured into standing on, when the symbols seemingly carved into the ground started to glow brightly.

"You demon! You took my son from me, now it's payback time!" The hysterical shinobi screamed as he jumped over the top of Gaara's sand and landed in front of the wary teen who was now gathering the sand at his feet to deal with the rogue ninja. "I'm gonna send you straight to hell!" He roared before he slapped his hand on the base of the circular seal, took his kunai, raised it above his flattened hand and with one final scream, plunged the dark steel dagger straight through the waiting appendage.

The Ichibi host was baffled by this show of self harm, to the point of raising one of his invisible eyebrows, but refused to let whatever plan the crazed ninja had concocted happen. The insomniac gathered the rest of his sand and formed a spear in his hand, ready to kill the nuisance in his way; though, he wanted to note, it was out of self-defence and not enjoyment, this time.

The **former** -psychopath was about to throw the lance at the impaled man kneeling only a few feet away from him, but as his arm drew back he actually dropped the sand javelin, as his body coursed with pain like no other he had felt before, when blue bolts of electricity sizzled through the doubled-over teen's body.

" _Kin-jutsu: Demon world transport!_ " The bleeding man on the ground spoke as he used his one un-impaled hand, now free of the kunai, to form a single hand sign in front of his face. After he had announced the name of his jutsu he began to laugh maniacally.

The pained teenager could do nothing to stop the forbidden-technique as it was completed and the man, who had tears streaming down his face, howled with laughter, appearing to melt into the glowing circular seal.

The man continued his uproarious cachinnation, even as his face started to turn into a flesh coloured liquid and poured into the seal that was still paralyzing the immobilised host, who was now on all fours as the glowing of the markings intensified.

The light was blinding at this point for Gaara, who could hear others approaching over the crackling of the electricity. The helpless warrior could only hope that those shinobi were friendly.

As it turned out, they were about as friendly as he could have hoped for: his siblings. The pair ran forwards, through the narrow valley, towards their crippled little brother who was struggling to stay conscious in the electrically charged field that was still subduing him.

Temari and Kankuro had both been performing their usual patrols around the village outskirts when they felt an immense burst of chakra coming from the mountains several miles outside of the village. Without so much as requesting assistance they sped there as quickly as their feet would carry them. In any other case, the pair probably wouldn't have rushed so desperately to the source of the disturbance, but they could only think of one source for that magnitude of chakra and their little red-haired brother had gone out on a mission a few hours before in that general direction. When they arrived, they were shocked to see their supposedly demonic younger brother being electrocuted by blue lightning bolts whilst writhing in a pile of his own sand inside some sort of shining array that neither of them recognised.

Gaara tried to look up at his older siblings but lost consciousness soon after their arrival because of the pain from the seal still holding him down, dragging him into darkness.

Temari gasped as Gaara's head dropped to the ground and was about to approach him to help in any way she could, but was held back by Kankuro who quickly shouted, "Don't! You'll get caught in whatever that thing is as well!"

As soon as the black-rimmed eyes had shut, the glowing of the array had intensified, unnoticed by Kankuro and Temari, until the light was bright enough for them to have to avert their gazes from it.

Suddenly, in the midst of the crackling of the electricity and the blowing of the wind in the valley, a boom sounded, like nothing either of the two conscious teens in the desert had ever heard before. The explosion may have been in sound only, but as soon as it had been sounded, the entire chasm they were standing in went completely silent, except for the slight echoing of the explosion and the continuing soft howling of the wind that their country was famous for.

Both of the remaining sand siblings looked back for their teammate and family to see nothing, not even the symbols that had been carved into the rock, were there anymore. The entire scene had been wiped out. Gaara, his sand and any residual chakra was gone.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Temari looked at the scene and then after finally registering that he was gone, searched the surrounding area for any trace of her little brother's or the one-tailed beast's chakra, but found nothing. At this revelation, Temari broke down into fits of hysterical tears at the sudden apparent death of their younger brother. No matter what he had done, they had still loved him, and now he was gone.

Gaara awoke, or at least he assumed he was awake because of the pain, to a blackness. Not a swirling blackness or a flashing one, but an absolute darkness that made the Tanuki-host question his sight. He would have dwelled on this worry of blindness but he was interrupted by what seemed to be slashes to his torso, then his back, then to his chest and his legs and his arms. From every conceivable angle, Gaara was cut to shreds. Whilst this excruciating feeling was tearing through Gaara's system, he felt an inexplicable feeling, as if he was being pulled and pushed in every direction and yet still falling. All of these sensations made the battered boy almost slip into a peaceful unconscious slumber once again, but for some unknown reason, sleep would not come.

Wherever the injured boy was, time didn't seem to exist, as it felt as if he had been falling for hours upon hours or maybe even days or weeks, and yet there had been no change in visibility, and then, all too suddenly, he found himself outside of the darkness, still falling, but now that was the only sensation of movement.

Gaara was glad as he impacted on the relative softness of the grass combined with the sandy remains of his gourd, as the two soft surfaces had stopped the battered ninja from breaking his neck or back after his considerable fall. Even more so, Gaara was glad because the freezing cold grass was aiding in numbing the wounds that literally covered his body.

It must have been night time wherever he had landed, Gaara surmised, because he couldn't see more than twenty feet away from himself, despite the waning moon above him; then again, he was in so much pain, that to think straight enough to focus his eyes would have been a monumental and ultimately impossible task. And he wasn't sure he wanted to see that much, he couldn't have done much even with his sight at that point. It turned out that the slashing feelings that he had endured for however long he had been in the darkness, were in fact cuts littering his body. Most were relatively shallow and harmless but one or two were larger and definitely more serious if left untreated. Adding blood loss to possible hypothermia and the inability to move to help himself, things weren't looking too good for the ex-sociopath.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Sirius Black was by no means a precautious man, or at least he hadn't been so before, but ever since he had managed to escape from Azkaban prison, using his animagus abilities, he had been more careful than he had previously thought possible. That being said, that didn't mean that when he was longingly staring out of the highest window of his current hideaway, the Shrieking Shack, and saw someone suddenly start to fall from the darkened sky, he wasn't going to go and try to help whoever it was.

Black ran from the bedroom he had been sat in and morphed into his black-dog form when he reached the front of the house before pounding out of one of the small dog-sized cracks, into the cold grassy grounds outside of the most haunted house in Britain.

When the dog-formed man reached his goal, it was far from what he expected. The first part of the child that caught his attention was the blazing red hair on the boy's head. Unlike the 'red' hair of the Weasley family that was more akin to orange than actual red, this red-head was the colour of blood. The next thing Sirius noticed was the actual blood coming from the countless wounds on the still form in front of him, even seeping through his clothes. The sole heir of the Black name couldn't think of any spell that would have this devastating affect on a body, not even _Sectumsempra_ left this kind of damage, nor did he want to think of a person willing to perform such a horrendous type of magic on a child.

The second thing he noticed, was the volume of sand surrounding the still body. As if he had been cushioned by the small desert beneath him, the boy didn't seem to have any wounds pertaining to the fall itself, only the hundreds of cuts all over the body.

The escapee looked around the surrounding area to check for dementors or worse: tourists, and after he was sure he was alone, he changed back into his raggedy human form and carried the surprisingly light child in his arms back to his hide-out. On his way back to his temporary home, Sirius couldn't help but slow down to relish the chill in the air. That was one of the few luxuries he enjoyed as a dog, a thick fur coat, but that didn't mean he wouldn't savour any rare chances to feel the cold night's chill on his skin now that he was free, in a manner of speaking. When he reached the door-less house he quickly thought on his feet and used his foot to widen the hole he had been using until that point.

Once inside the rotten and run down house, the animagus went to work helping the boy who had fallen from the sky. Firstly, he removed the boy's shirt to get a better look at the wounds that seemed to get worse and worse the more he looked. The man ran into the next room and got a bowl of water to clean some of the blood off before he inspected the wounds properly. For the most part they were superficial lacerations that weren't doing much damage on their own. A few may have grazed an organ or two but the only thing the man could do was wrap them tightly in the cleanest material he could find in the decrepit house and hope for the best.

As he was finishing, he was at the boy's neck and, after an inspection, decided to wrap the slash he found there tightly too. Luckily the deep wound on the neck hadn't even touched the jugular, not that a simple wizard like he would have known about human anatomy, but he knew that if neck cut, and lots of red stuff come out, that bad. What was worrying, was that the gash had sliced through his in the larynx. He wrapped up the neck and a few of the larger cuts that were visible on the boy's face before setting him down.

Whilst Black had worked on the boy's porcelain-like face, he couldn't help but notice two things, other than the incredibly pale skin. Those were: the ridiculously dark shadows around his eyes that looked as if he had gone ten years without sleep, and the large red tattoo/scar on his forehead that appeared to be some foreign symbol.

As he sat back, Sirius had to admire his handiwork of the last hour and a half. The boy was covered in bandages from head to toe, and still the convict could see the boy was around the same age as his godson, if not a little younger. The jailbird had wanted to at least see Harry as soon as he broke out of prison, but now he couldn't leave the boy for at least few months, maybe more, judging by his wounds. He would have to put off seeing his best friend's son until he came to visit Hogsmeade in the fall as a student.

Sirius checked the boy's pocket for a wand or identification but found no sign of either. The only thing he found was some sort of bandanna with a metal plate engraved with some sort of hourglass symbol, attached to some kind of leather sash that had run across the boy's chest and up his back.

After a few minutes of watching the shallow breathing of the heavily wounded teenager, Sirius turned back into a dog and took a small sniff of the boy's scent and went outside into the night to see if there was anything of the boy's left out there. Startlingly, the sand that the boy had landed in, smelt strongly of the red-head, as if he had been with it for years. Sirius padded up to the patch of sand covered ground and started to dig around in it to see if there was anything buried in there that could help identify the mysterious youth lying in his current refuge.

The dog rejoiced when he discovered something. It was a pouch. The small purple bag was fairly heavy when Sirius picked it up with his mouth and ran back to the makeshift front door of the shrieking shack. When he was back in the main room he used, where the boy was still lying, he reverted to his original form and sat down cross-legged on the floor to examine what the boy was carrying. Perhaps he could find some clue in there as to what had happened.

Sirius was shocked to find several knives, star-shaped bladed weapons and pads of paper with strange writing on them. The writing was different to what was on the boy's forehead and seemed more like a pattern than actual writing. Maybe it was money?

Sirius was about to pick up the stack of papers to inspect them further, when he saw something move out of the corner of his eye. He looked over to see…

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Gaara had been having the nicest dream he could remember having; it consisted of him sitting down with his mother and father, his aunt and sister and brother and them eating a meal together. They had all talked and laughed and had a nice time with each other. No mention of shinobi or wars or demons. It was so pleasant, he had wished he would never wake up. Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end.

When the panda-eyed boy woke he was immediately assaulted by the almost overpowering pain from his wounds, but pushed through the immense agony to look around himself. He surmised he was in an old shabby house and it was still night time. He then noticed the other person in the room. In any other situation he would have jumped into at least a defensive stance or cocoon himself in sand but could do neither for lack of strength and sand. He couldn't move a muscle.

It was then, Gaara, out of the corner of his eye, saw the man rummaging through his weapons-pouch about to touch his exploding tags. With all the strength he could muster, Gaara opened his mouth and was about to tell him to stop, but nothing came out, no words, no sound, nothing. Fortunately the movement of his mouth was enough to draw the man's attention.

Sirius immediately stopped going through the other's possessions and turned towards the intensely glaring boy on the floor a few feet from him. "Hello," Sirius started, trying to ease some of the tension he was feeling because of the gaze on him. "My name is…actually, never mind," He continued, he'd almost revealed he was the murderer wanted by the entire magical and muggle communities, though he wasn't all too sure that the boy was even a wizard. He didn't have a wand, he wasn't dressed in wizarding robes, and he had wounds that looked more like they were from a muggle weapon than a wizard, also he hadn't immediately recognised him from the pictures that were undoubtedly in every bar and on every shop in the wizarding world. "I found you outside. You, uh... fell from the sky. Do you remember what happened? Could you tell me your name? Where did you come from?" The man asked, hoping for even a slither of information.

Gaara looked at the scruffy man sat across from him and once again with great effort opened his mouth to talk but couldn't utter a syllable. The red haired tanuki host kept trying to speak but it soon became apparent that he couldn't. One of the cuts had apparently severed his vocal cords it seemed. After this, the red-head just closed his mouth and went back to sleep. He needed to conserve his energy.

The fugitive of the dementors watched this display until the boy went back to sleep and slipped back out of the room as quietly as possible so that he could go and get some food. This had been worrying him whilst he dressed the boy's wounds. He had been turning into a dog and eating in that form, rabbits and small mammals had been enough to sustain him, but now he had a fully human boy who needed to be fed. It made Sirius laugh at the thought that he wanted to take care of Harry one day. He was fairly sure that neither boy would appreciate a dead rabbit presented to them by a large black dog for dinner.

The man came to his front door and shifted to his 'grim' form and ran off into the woods to hunt, in a manner. First Sirius dealt with his own hunger by finding a cute little bunny rabbit… and eating it. After he was done there he ran to Hogsmeade village to help his new ward.

One may have questioned Sirius' surprisingly charitable and caring actions towards a boy he'd never met, but it was easily explainable. Sirius had always been a caring person; he had been deprived of the care he craved as a child until he met his best friend James and their various other friends. When he had been sent to the detestable prison he had been removed from anyone he cared about and now that he was out, he just wanted someone to talk to. It also didn't hurt that the mysterious boy looked a little like Lily, due to the hair and the eyes, and was about the same age as Harry. All of that added to the fact that for the last few weeks, he had had nothing to do except skulk around as a dog or look out of the window longingly at the woods and edges of the village of Hogsmeade.

His musings were soon interrupted when he came upon the edge of the woods, marking the beginnings of the sole town for miles around. Sirius made his way around the outskirts until he spotted one of the back alleys he recognised. He recognised this particular back alley because, as man may not live on bread along, Sirius may not live on rabbit and mole alone. He had found this little gem after four days of living in the shrieking shack and eating nothing but woodland creatures.

Sirius-dog walked up to the darkened alley and sat down, waiting for what he was sure would be worth the wait.

Sure enough a few hours later and the back door opened to reveal a large burly man carry out a bucket of waste materials from the bakery inside. As soon as the black dog was spotted a wide smile was set upon the large man's face before he finished his task and walked back inside in quite a haste whilst leaving the door agape. Soon enough he returned, carrying with him a large loaf of bread, fresh from the oven.

"'Ere ya go pooch." The man slurred as he chucked the loaf to the ground as was routine by now. The man had discovered the dog sniffing through his shop's bins a couple of weeks ago and had a soft spot for dogs. As such, he had brought him a loaf whenever he saw him, which wasn't that often, every two or three days.

Sirius wasted no time before snatching up the bread and carried it back through the woods as quickly as possible. He soon arrived back at the familiar setting of the shack before padding in quietly, dropping the loaf and zooming back out to get something else.

Around a quarter of an hour later and he arrived back with a slight toothy grin around the rabbit in his mouth. He dropped that too and changed back swiftly and carried the rabbit and bread upstairs and into the main bedroom to see the boy was once again awake.

"I'll make you some food; do you understand what I am saying?" Sirius questioned with a smile whilst he knelt down and started to strip some of the dry wood from his surroundings and make kindling.

Whilst he worked he looked over to the other in the room who had looked at him with a face as unreadable as the scruffy-man had thought possible, and nodded slowly before turning his head to the ceiling.

A little while later Sirius Black was just finishing cooking the rabbit he had since skinned, cleaned and so forth, before skewering and suspending over the warm fire. It was a warm and well appreciated change from raw meat and plain bread.

Not long after the wrongly convicted man had finished his amateur cooking, he stripped the meat as best as he could and used the bread to hold it making a few rabbit sandwiches ready to eat.

The still kneeling man moved over to the lying boy before helping him to sit up. He had been very careful and tried not to reopen any of the wounds that littered the bandaged body and of course there was the problem of the pain that could only have been unbearable for any normal human.

Luckily Gaara wasn't any normal human being; he was a shinobi who could handle pain, despite what past Chunin exams may have led one to believe.

After he was sat upright, Gaara attempted to eat the crudely made bunny sandwich. It was a valiant attempt but what both had forgotten was the large gash in the hungry injured boy's throat. After the first try, resulting in a bloodied cough and a few reopened wounds, Gaara gave up on the food in front of him; instead, he turned his head and hoped the stranger would get the hint and let him back down gently. He did.

Over the next few days Sirius Black continued to take care of the bedridden mystery teen that he had been calling Lily in his head. Just a bit of an ironic joke. Though he didn't dare say that particular thought out loud because the teen was scarier than most of the Death Eaters he had ever met, put together. It was the eyes, they were so cold.

The falsely accused had been getting bread almost every day and making crude stews as best he could. As far as he could tell, they weren't doing any more damage to Lily's throat; but from what he had seen, Lily appeared to be mute or maybe he was just very quiet.

A week after the boy had arrived, Sirius had been astounded by the fact that he was able to stand and walk without help. Well, he was incredibly shaky and could only take a few steps but to be able to recover from those extensive injuries in such a short amount of time was unheard of without around the clock care from a medical witch or wizard. When Sirius had redressed the wounds most of them were already healed or healing.

Just over a week after his arrival, Gaara was lying where he usually did, looking over at his caretaker cooking more stew. The sand-user didn't know what meat it was but the food itself wasn't that bad. At least he was healing normally, for him. As bad as Jinchūriki had to suffer, there was the upside of super fast healing. What irked Gaara the most was that his throat didn't seem to be healing at all, other than having closed over. He guessed his vocal chords had been fully severed and were beyond repair. It really didn't make much difference to his already fairly distant persona but it would be a hindrance in the future.

Gaara stopped his thoughts when he heard the man speak, "My name, it's Sirius." He said clearly and concisely without any hesitation. Gaara couldn't help but wonder why he'd waited a week before revealing it. "I'm a criminal on the run. I didn't want to tell you my name because I was feared you might have heard of it." It was funny how often his questions were answered without him asking the question out loud.

"I don't suppose you can tell me your name, can you?" Sirius asked rhetorically, "I actually knew someone with hair as red as yours many years ago," He continued absentmindedly. "I guess if I don't know your real name I'll just call you Lily." He said with a chuckle and a smile wide enough to show of his gruesome blackened teeth as he continued with the cooking.

The red-head grimaced. He wasn't quite as happy with the new name as his saviour, who continued with his cooking oblivious to the coldest stare he would ever receive, to his back. Nor did he or Gaara notice the faintest sign of a blush creep onto the boy's face.

It was only a few more days later and Gaara was able to walk unaided which was a massive relief to him. He hadn't done anything since he had arrived except the occasional trip to the bathroom and a shaky walk around the room to stave off muscular-dystrophy. Both of which had been painful but wholly necessary.

Gaara's first plan was to leave and go back to the Wind country or, failing that, at least get to the Fire country. Unfortunately he didn't know what land he was in or even what continent. Gaara looked over to the man who was sitting at the window, looking out forlornly like he often did when he wasn't preoccupied taking care of Gaara, he gave a little wave to get the dirty man's attention ever-silently before gesturing for a pen.

When Sirius looked towards his charge he was shocked to see the gesture the boy was making. He had his fingers positioned in a small grip and was waving it in a downwards movement. For most muggles and even shinobi this would have been a clear sign for a pen or a brush and ink in the latter's case, but to the fully grown wizard that was undoubtedly, and wrongly, identified as the gesture for a wand.

"You want a wand, Lily? Are you a wizard?" He asked flabbergasted at his own naivety. "And here I thought you were just a muggle." He laughed as he walked over and sat down.

Gaara was confused, mostly by the words 'wand', 'wizard' and 'muggle'; he was so confused that he forgot to glare when he was called by a girl's name again. He had never come across 'muggle' and could only think of children's fairy tales when he heard the words 'wand' and 'wizard', so he was sure that he had been mistaken. In an attempt to convey his ignorance on the subject to the other he tilted his head to the side.

Sirius would have happily lent his wand temporarily to the young 'wizard', but that was long gone. It had been snapped after he was arrested all those years ago like all convicts' wands were. "Sorry, I don't have a wand anymore."

Gaara shook his head and redid the pen gesture but slower, hoping the kind but utterly oblivious man might get the message.

"Oh a pen!" Sirius exclaimed in a rare bout of realisation and clarity. "I'll see if I can go get you one." He said as he walked to the door "Oh, and Lily," he had opened the door "-forget what I said about wands and wizards, it was all a…umm… joke." The falsely accused hoped the peeved teen might just buy the quick lie.

He didn't.

After a quick trip up to Hogsmeade and back, the dog had managed to craftily swipe a quill from an open window. It was a lucky find by any standards. By the time he got back, 'Lily' had gotten dressed in his old, very worn clothes and was sitting by the window. The black bandanna with the silver metal plate was now tied around his neck instead of around his large leather sash, which was probably to cover up the scar on his throat, Sirius guessed.

As per usual, Sirius had changed back into human form before re-entering the derelict haunted house. He walked over to the teen and handed the quill to him, curious as to what he was going to say first.

As soon as he got the quill, Gaara moved to the wall and started to write, 'My name is Gaara. Not Lily.' The deadly glare aimed at Sirius was all the punctuation the message needed.

With a nervous chuckle Sirius said "I think I liked 'Lily' better. So, where do you come from?"

'Sunagakure, of the Wind country' He scrawled quickly, but when he saw the questioning look on the other's face as he read it, he continued to write 'of the Elemental Nations'. Still there was no look of recognition on Sirius' face. 'Where am I?'

"You are in the Shrieking-shack, just outside of Hogsmeade village," Predictably this didn't earn any sign of acknowledgement so he added "Very close to Hogwarts." This was sort of a test to see if the boy was infact a young wizard. Nothing. The boy just continued his even looking before writing.

'What country?'

"England, part of Great Britain."

The red-head sat still in a considerable pause. Before continuing the partially written conversation 'What are wizards?'

This stunned the man who was sat across from the mute teen, he hadn't expected that question, yet, after he thought about it he realized he should have. The only thing he could do was be honest. He wasn't closely connected enough to any muggles to help the boy unless he told him 'the big secret' and helped him through wizarding means.

"Okay, but first tell me what happened to you." said Sirius.

'I was attacked by someone from my village who used a jutsu that sent me through a dark place, where I got the wounds, and then I landed here.' Gaara purposefully left out the part about killing the man's son.

"What is a jut-su?" Sirius asked, completely mispronouncing the word. The entire story seemed very odd. To be sent through some sort of portal sounded very much like magic. 'Maybe they just don't call them wizards where he comes from.' Sirius thought hopefully.

'A ninjutsu, a ninja technique. It's pronounced jootsoo.' The boy wrote before shuffling over to another wall, he was running out of writing space, which he imagined would be a hindrance for the rest of his life if he was to forever be mute.

"I've never heard of a ninjutsu." The baffled man thought out loud.

'A shinobi uses chakra to do various techniques.' Gaara explained, trying not to go into too much detail about the complex and irrelevant nature of being a ninja.

"And you're one of these 'Shinobi'?" Sirius questioned excitedly. This was extraordinary, to find another culture that used magic completely separate from his own was groundbreaking.

'Yes.'

"Could you show me one of your jutsus?"

'Not right now. I need sand to use my techniques. Most ninja have techniques unique to them.' He quickly wrote on the grimy lime green wall.

As the red-head looked back at the man he saw a smile appear on his face before he got to his feet and moved to the door on the other side of the room. "Wait here." The filthy man ran out of the room quickly and, unknown to Gaara, out of the house still in human form until he was the edge of the woods where he had first discovered Lily's' body. Sure enough there was still a pile of old sand lying there on the grass. It wasn't as pure as when it had first appeared, dirt was mixed in with it and most of it was damp and unusable, unbeknownst to Sirius who scooped up a large handful and ran back as fast as he could to the fascinating teen.

Sabaku no Gaara was shocked to say the least when he watched the man re-enter the room carrying a handful of sand with him. Granted, the sand was dirtier than Sirius himself and slightly damp which would have usually made manipulation impossible but the amount was so small that it should be possible to work it.

Sirius sat down cross legged just a few feet away from Gaara before turning his hand over and dropping the sand in between them, dusting his hands off to get rid of any left over sand stuck to them.

Another wave of surprise hit Gaara as he felt the familiar presence of his chakra mixed in with the sand. He knew as soon as he saw it, that it was his sand, which made it all the easier to move. Gaara outstretched his hand over the sand, palm faced down, and immediately it started to rise off the ground and crumble and reform in mid air, getting rid of the dirt and grass and any left over clumps of stuck together sand. Soon it was dry and pure like normal and waving around, though greatly reduced in quantity.

Sirius was astounded by this; normal wand-less magic was different from this. Usually a powerful wizard could perform the basics of spells without a wand and even then they were greatly weakened, but this boy seemed to be performing a floating charm on sand, which was difficult in itself, not only without a wand but also without saying the spell, which was unheard of.

"That's amazing!" Sirius bellowed. "I've never seen a wiza- I mean, anyone do anything like this. With this you could probably get into Hogwarts, even though you're over the age for first years!"

'Hogwarts?' Gaara had crushed the sand into a small ball and dropped it into his pocket for later use before picking the quill back up. It was the only sand he had at this point and he couldn't even defend himself against an academy trainee with it…well he probably could but he didn't like his chances against anyone worth fighting.

"It's a school for young witches and wizards, and I think you would qualify." Sirius said. "I'll ask an old friend of mine to get you in, if you want."

Gaara was surprised by this proposition but shook his head signalling a clear 'no'. He wrote on the wall 'I have to get back to my people.' As soon as he wrote this, Sirius seemed to deflate a little, inside and out, his previous childlike excitement from the idea of being involved in Hogwarts was gone.

Dejected Sirius replied "Okay." before moving to the window to stare outside, obviously disappointed, though that didn't change Gaara's mind even in the slightest.

Gaara moved the quill back to the mouldy green wall and wrote 'What are wizards, muggles and wands?'

What followed was a lengthy; and, mostly, one-sided explanation of magic, the wizarding world and the war with 'He-who-shall-not-be-named' that still barely scratched the surface of the vast and apparently complicated world Gaara was in and by the end of it, the silent ninja was sick and tired of magic and Earth.

After the conversation Gaara washed his writing off of the wall, to keep what he said a secret. He was still first and foremost a ninja who needed to cover his tracks.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

The next day, Gaara went into Hogsmeade village to get food, though 'get' might have been the wrong word, 'steal' seemed more appropriate. As the tanuki-host reached the town, he was relieved to be among other people after so long in that one room which wasn't to say that he didn't like Sirius, not at all, the man had been very kind to him and despite his despised nickname, he had no real problem with the man, well… except maybe the smell. It was uncanny, the way the man smelled almost exactly like a wet-dog. It was one of the things the man had neglected to explain.

It was refreshing for Gaara, to be able to walk through a village and not be watched like a monster or recognised at all. He did get one or two bewildered looks for the tattered and strange clothes he wore as well as his universally strange appearance, the red spiky hair, black rimmed scary pupil-less eyes and the prominent tattoo on his forehead.

After he had entered the main high street of Hogsmeade, Gaara sought out the nearest back alley and crouched down behind a rubbish bin. When he was sure he was hidden, he moved his hand into his pocket and pulled out the small sand coloured ball he had dropped in there the day before.

When it was free, he opened his palm and let it float just above his palm before it dispersed into a small cloud of granules, moving freely like a miniature sandstorm in his hand. Almost immediately after, the cloud snaked down to the ground before forming into a loose gaseous drill shape and burrowing in between the cobblestone floor and out of sight. Most of the sand that had been left outside of the Shrieking Shack was unusable, the only reason he could use the small amount Sirius had brought him was precisely because of its small quantity. He had thus decided to create an all-new gourd out of the rocks in this world. From the small amounts he'd been able to break down outside of the shack, this world's minerals took in his chakra just as well as the ones in his world did. Gaara had had to come into the local village in order to survey what other types of stone were in the area; the rocks around where he was currently living were all far too hard to break down with the meager amount of sand at his disposal so he had little choice but to look elsewhere.

As it would be several hours before he would have enough sand to fill his gourd, which he would also have to make out of more sand, Gaara left the back alley and went back towards the relatively busy high street, before he found a bench situated outside a shop and sat down in order to concentrate on controlling the sand that was now grinding its way around underground. Fortunately, for such a highly trained shinobi, meditation for a few hours was child's play. Unfortunately for the ex-insomniac, he hadn't quite mastered the practices of sleeping and waking up. As such, when he sat down and closed his eyes to 'meditate' for an hour or two, he didn't expect to wake up twelve hours later, in the dark with a dog nudging his leg insistently.

Gaara quickly surveyed his surroundings upon waking, like he'd been trained, and soon realised his folly. It was late, really late. All of the residents of the small village had since deserted the streets and it was rapidly cooling down outside.

Gaara looked down at Sirius, a.k.a the dog, and ruffled the fur on the top of its head before chuckling silently at how it moved its head into the touch. The dog was large and smelly and had dark fur; ironically the red-head could only think how similar it was to Sirius.

Gaara walked away from the apparent stray dog and back into the back alley where he had visited earlier that day when he decided he'd given the poor mongrel enough attention. He had no more time to spare, seeing as how he had said he'd be back in an hour or two and it had since been half a day. His private nurse-maid would surely be hysterical by this point.

When he was back in the darkened corner of the inner village, he stood straight this time whilst he looked around to see nobody except the smelly black dog who sat patiently off to the side around. Deciding to ignore the non-sentient being, Gaara raised his arm until it was fully outstretched in front of him and parallel with the ground before splaying his fingers and bringing his other hand to just a few inches away from his chin before making a fist and pointing two fingers upwards in a one-handed ram hand seal. Soon, the ground started to rumble lightly, making Sirius-dog whine uncertainly.

Not long after, a stream of sand started to fall upwards out of the hole that he himself had drilled into the cobbled street. The flow continued until the ball of sand floating before him was roughly twice the size of a beach ball, turning slowly above of Gaara's outstretched arm.

Gaara looked intently at the ball of sand before closing his hand, forcing his chakra into the shell of the sand whilst watching it transform into his nostalgic gourd shape with even the red markings and the cork made out of sand. The sand-gourd floated around to Gaara's back before being tied on. He felt elated to have the familiar feeling of the giant sand container affixed to his back.

Sirius had gotten worried when his ward hadn't come back after several hours, so he had changed into dog form to find him. He had looked everywhere that the mute teen could've been hiding until he finally got a chance to look around the usually busier parts of Hogsmeade when most of the wizards and squibs had cleared out.

He had found the sleeping teen sitting on one of the numerous benches that littered the busy wizarding village.

Earlier that day, many of the regulars to Hogsmeade village had heard rumours and seen the mysterious red-haired racoon boy asleep on a public bench. At one point, a half-giant from a local school had attempted to get close to the boy to wake him up out of concern, but when he got within five feet, the boy had let out a blood chilling growl without waking up, a growl that could well have been a snore from the usually silent sleeper. From that point on, no one attempted to rouse the beast container, until a large black dog came walking along at night.

With his trusted gourd now back where it belonged, Gaara strode into the high street again and looked around until he found the local bakery, which luckily still had a few loafs out on display in the shop front. Gaara didn't particularly like the idea of stealing, but he didn't have any money, nor did he know what currency these 'wizards' used. Sirius had explained the more generalised information regarding the world he was in but there were still massive amounts he didn't know.

As Gaara stood by the the bakery's front door, the cork in the gourd turned into sand before the small amount floated into the lock of the old styled wooden door; soon an audible click was heard signalling access to the bakery was now possible. Gaara didn't enter the bakery himself, he merely had a tendril of sand swoop in and pick up a pair of loaves of before closing the door and relocking it.

The red-head wrapped up the bread, and silently and motionlessly commanded the sand to fly out of his gourd and in front of him. He piled up the sand until it was a foot thick and two feet wide, plenty of room to stand on. Gaara looked down at the old mangy dog that had followed him with a look of awe on its face unlike any dog that had come before it, before floating off on the sand platform.

The mangy dog wasn't too happy about this latest turn of events. As quickly as his doggy legs would take him, the escaped convict sprinted back to the shrieking shack. Fortunately, after the lengthy run, he discovered he had in fact arrived first.

That night they quietly sat and ate the bread without Sirius even attempting to start another conversation or rant. He had been shocked by the Suna-nin's control over the sand, without a wand or any magical artefact. But Sirius was a man with his own secrets, and he wasn't going to pressure his new friend over his.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

The next day, for Gaara, was started by a rather rude awakening by a nervous and sickly looking brunette clumsily disturbing his slumber. Gaara had been woken by the loud banging that presumably came from whoever-was-approaching's shoes. Gaara waited, safe in the knowledge that he could kill whoever it was before they could scream for help, if they meant any harm to himself or his friend, Sirius. However, when the man had burst into the room, he had seemed more startled by the presence of a second person, other than Sirius, than Gaara had been that the intruder had entered the room so brashly.

Remus Lupin had been the one to help Sirius get to the Shrieking Shack, being one of the few people who knew the real reason it made the terrible sounds on the nights of the full moon. Then, he had left, several weeks ago, to deal with some problems that had arisen with his application for the Defence Against the Dark Arts post. When he had arrived back at Hogwarts to drop off his books and most of his other worldly possessions, he had not been given the chance to visit his oldest living friend until the entire teaching staff had been told to go around the surrounding area to warn the villagers that there would be a sweep by the dementors. To that day Lupin didn't know how much Dumbledore had known about his involvement with Sirius' escape, but it was a great opportunity nonetheless to warn his friend.

"Padfoot, who's that?" Lupin exclaimed as he looked down at the strange teenager who was looking directly back at him with terrifying eyes.

As Sirius groggily sat up, resting back on one elbow, he replied, "His name is Lily," he quickly corrected himself as he saw the terrifying glare that was now being directed towards him, "-at least, that's what I call him. His real name is Gaara."

"Gaara?"

"I still think Lily suits him better; you see it too, don't you, the resemblance..." Sirius remarked whilst hoisting himself up to standing position.

Lupin was about to laugh at his friend's antics but was too afraid of the boy who was now sitting cross-legged under the blankets glaring intently at the man with the beard.

"I meant, where did he come from?"

"Gaara here, is a ninja from another country," Sirius said before continuing after he saw a blank look on his friends face, "He was badly injured, so I thought I would take care of him until he was back to full health."

"Is he a, um…muggle?" Lupin all but whispered the last part, as if it was curse, although in actuality it was more likely he didn't want to say a wizarding term in front of a suspected muggle.

"Well, no and yes," Said Black, with a slightly confused look on his face, much like the one of Lupin's own face. "He can use magic, but he's never been schooled in wizardry."

"Excuse my friend here," Lupin had turned to the now calm looking Gaara, "Sirius here has the best intentions but… why don't you tell me about yourself."

After ignoring the taken aback look the man behind him had displayed at his casual insult, Remus waited for the answer that didn't come until Sirius exclaimed "Oh! Right! I forgot to mention, Gaara can't talk."

"Don't you think it would have been a good idea to tell me that first, Sirius?" Lupin sighed as he apologized to the annoyed mute.

"So, to what do we owe the pleasure of this visit, Moony?" Sirius swiftly changed the subject.

"Well, I was going to tell you that there's going to be a sweep of the area by dementors soon, and the teachers were told to go and warn anyone not on the run but I thought it might be good if I gave you a heads up anyway." Lupin said, shortly before turning on his heel and walking to the broken old door out of the bedroom they were currently in. "I suggest you turn into Padfoot and make yourself scarce as well as mister Gaara here before those monsters are upon you."

"Thank you, old friend. I'll see you again soon, I hope."

"Maybe. It was nice meeting you Gaara."

And with those few words, the short visit was over.

"Will you be okay without me for a few hours?" Sirius asked.

*Nod*

"Okay, good. Just go and wait in Hogsmeade for a while until the all clear is sounded and then make your way back here." He said as he too turned towards the pale green door, "And if you feel a chill or hear that a dementor is near, run. They are evil monsters that will suck the soul out of you."

Another *nod*

"I'll see you later; I need to talk to you about something when I get back. I might be going away for a few days."

Soon, Gaara was left in the old room all on his own, and didn't waste any more time before strapping his gourd to his back and walking out of the house after attaching his forehead protector around his neck to hide his most prominent visible scar.

The streets of Hogsmeade were barren with no more than two or three wizards quickly scuttling around with terrified looks set upon their faces. 'Oh, how nostalgic.' Gaara bitterly thought, 'Just like home; all it needs now is-'

"Monster!" Gaara was surprised that that actually happened.

About twenty feet down the street, stood a man backing away slowly from a floating black hooded…monster. The thought 'At least he wasn't talking to me...' passed through the shinobi's mind briefly before he started to walk forwards, towards the disturbance. He couldn't just sit back and watch someone get their soul sucked out; plus, he wanted to use his powers properly for the first time since his arrival in the strange land. Stretch his proverbial legs.

As soon as the red head had come within ten feet of the wraith-like creature, it seemed to spasm into activity and completely ignored the man who was now running for his life, or, rather, his soul.

The dementor seemed to swim through the air towards the tanuki-host, who had since removed the cork from his gourd and was readying himself for the dementor's attack. It came close to him, and that was when he felt its terrible effects, except they didn't seem all that terrible to him, in fact, he barely noticed the difference except the temperature drop.

The only other effect that Gaara felt was that he began to relive every bad word said to him and every one of his murders and rampages, but Gaara was not ashamed to admit that he had never forgotten these travesties. He may have been reliving them more vividly than he had in even his most daunting nightmare, but he wasn't bothered by the recollection. He was a boy with a sad past, one of the saddest pasts in the worlds and so the dementors were predictably drawn to him but he would never forget the bad things that had happened and the bad things he had caused. Like someone had once taught him, he couldn't be distracted by dwelling on the horrors of his past, just move forward and protect those who were precious to him.

The dementor was so close to Gaara, only now could he really appreciate the size of the reaper, all eight foot of it. Just as one of its disgusting, deformed and decomposing arms slid towards his neck with every intention of choking him half to death before kissing the soul out of him, just as the fingers were within grabbing distance of his hitai-ate, a wall of sand seemed to appear out of nowhere next to the prison guard before it slammed into it with such force that it was sent into the wall of the shop over thirty feet away. Unfortunately, for Gaara, because of the almost liquid form of the thing, it was still able to fly away after the savage beating it had just received without so much as a stumble or twitch.

Shaking off the persistent chill, the Jinchūriki walked away, hoping he would get another chance to get some battle practice before he returned to the shack.

It was about an hour later, an hour of boredom and aimless wandering without seeing a single human or dementor in all of that time, when he spotted another human being. The man was relatively tall, was wearing all black robes and had shoulder-length black hair, which was greasier than… anyone or anything he could think of. The man had a nasty sneer on his face as he strolled through the village with his arms crossed in front of his chest, which made Gaara internally chuckle slightly at the similarity to his own fighting pose. The similarities seemed to end there as the man approached Gaara as looked straight down his nose at the shorter, odd looking, boy who also had his arms crossed which he immediately disliked.

"Boy!" He spoke demanding respect "What are you doing out here? Or are you too stupid to understand that dementors are patrolling this area for the mass murderer Sirius Black?" Each syllable of the sarcastic and rhetorical question was pronounced clearly and concisely making it all the more annoying. Gaara really wished he could speak because there were a few choice words he might have spoken to the patronising man before him, and most of them would have earned him a lengthy lecture from Temari.

"Who are you, anyway? I would have remembered instructing someone like you." He questioned Gaara, giving a curious and almost disgusted look towards Gaara's tattered and foreign clothes. "You couldn't be a student of Hogwarts, even Hogwarts wouldn't let someone as dirty and uncouth as you enter. Now tell me who you are and what is that ridiculous thing on your back?" He said fully expecting the small boy before him to break down and tell him anything he wanted to know, but no changes could be seen except a contemptuous glare had formed on the boy's face. "By the looks of your hair I might even hazard a guess at a Weasley. Now, answer me!" Snape was getting angry by the point. Just the defiant look upon the strange boy's face was enough to ignite rage in him and was further fueled by the boy's continuing silence.

Without as much as an explanatory gesture, Gaara gave the man a quick once-over before turning around and walking away.

This, of course, enraged Snape sufficiently for him to draw his wand at the boy, hoping to scare the retched mongrel, but no sooner had his hand come out of his pocket than the ground around them began to frost over lightly.

Snape immediately regretted being there. As a relatively powerful wizard, Snape could defeat around five dementors or so with relative ease, but swooping down on them were around twenty and they seemed intent on the young tattooed boy who had since stopped walking and was standing completely still with his arms crossed and a almost unnoticeable smirk on his face, confirming Snape's suspicion of madness.

'Doesn't the boy know what is happening?' Snape screamed in his head as he backed away, hoping another one of the professors might chance by them and help, otherwise the boy was going to be kissed by the dementors. He _might_ have been able to fight off the dementors present, but by the time he had scared them off, he would have been at the mercy of anything else that had deemed fit to do him harm, including other dementors searching the area or even Sirius Black.

The entire multitude swam around Gaara and, for a moment, it looked as if he wasn't even there, just a pile of swirling black capes were visible but then something strange, even for wizards, happened. Out of nowhere, tens of sandy coloured spikes burst from the sphere of dementors, killing many of them. The rest continued circling around the ball of sand covered in the large spikes that had impaled the billowing monsters only moments before.

Snape was at a loss for words. No magic he had ever heard of could do this. His short-lived musings were interrupted once again by the transformation of the spike on the outside of the ball of sand into pointed tentacles that easily outnumbered the remaining prison guards. They soon finished off the last of the remaining monsters, receding into the ball of sand afterwards, before that too dissolved back into the gourd on the small red-head's back. Severus hadn't even noticed his mouth had been left agape until the boy had started to walk away again.

The potions master was unsure whether it would be wise to take the boy back to the castle, but as he watched the red-head walk away from him, he didn't have time to think things through more fully. He ran towards the boy and was about to grab his shoulder so he could drag him back to the castle, however, when his hand was within a few inches of the boy's body, a shield of sand stopped them from progressing any further.

"Boy! Come with me!" He commanded, trying once again with the other shoulder only to, once again, be stopped by the protective layer of sand that had hindered him before.

After the second attempt at grabbing him had failed, Gaara walked slightly faster away from the strange man who had, at first, seemed repulsed by the very sight of him and inclined to insult him, but now seemed intent on getting the him to go with him. It was only when Sabaku no Gaara noticed the man was still following him, that he relented. He couldn't risk leading the incredibly irritating man, apparently a teacher, back to Sirius and the shack.

Gaara turned around on his heel to look the man-of-grease in the eye.

Severus was shocked by this fortunate turn of events, though not for long as he spoke soon after "Follow me, and quickly."

The shinobi did consider using the body-flicker technique to escape or attack the man and run, but from what he had heard of magic from the escapee, who was undoubtedly skulking around the woods still, the hook nosed magician would probably be able to use some sort of spell to track him. In any case, he realised that his best bet would be to follow the taller man to wherever he needed to follow him to and sneak away later. In the worst case scenario he could simply use his sand and perform a little burial. It's hard for a corpse to track a person.

Snape had turned around when the other boy had signalled he would follow, and started to walk back to Hogwarts. Whatever this boy had done was remarkable and he guessed it was due to that strange item on his back. No doubt that it was some sort of dark magical artefact. It could be quite useful to them in the future.

The trek was quite difficult for the pale potions expert, as opposed to the trained ninja who often took longer strolls to wake himself up in the morning. By the time they had both reached the castle, the sky was just beginning to dim.

Snape then had to think of how to get the senior teachers attention without owling them or going around to each of their offices one by one. It was times like these that he wished he could use the dark mark, that'd get their attentions quickly enough.

What irritated the man more than the thought of them having to traipse around the entire castle was the sight of professor Dumbledore standing outside of the entrance, flanked by Lupin, McGonagall and Argus Filch; how Albus had known the boy and him were coming irked him greatly. The resident caretaker seemed decidedly disgruntled to be there, though his unhappiness was closely rivalled by Snape himself who wanted nothing more than a quiet year of teaching Defence Against the Dark Arts, but he had been passed over for the job once again.

"Good evening, Severus," Albus quietly said as he welcomed the two into the castle.

Gaara wasn't quite sure what to say, he couldn't have said it even if he knew, but nonetheless he wouldn't have known what to say anyway. He had followed the grossly unfit man towards the expansive castle that was bigger than the Kazekage's building and the Daimyo's castle combined. None of this awe, however minor, showed on the mute's face as they approached the open doors of the enormous castle.

"Headmaster," Snape greeted back in his usual annoyed way before stepping to the side so that the teen following him could walk to the front and the others could deal with him. "I was searching the village for Black, and warning everyone of the dementors, when I saw this boy-" He said, giving the scary child a quick glance, "-kill over twenty dementors, without a wand."

At that statement, most gasped and even Dumbledore lowered his gaze so that he could look directly at the boy. What really scared the old man, were the boy's eyes. No matter the feat that Severus had reported the boy to have done; those eyes told so many more chilling and unknowable stories that for the first time in over a decade, he was actually afraid of something. None of this showed on his face of course, but it sent chills up and down Albus' spine.

"What's your name, young man?" He said, managing not to concentrate too much on the boy-in-front-of-him's eyes.

"He won't speak," Snape said with pure malice dripping off his voice.

"Can you speak?" Albus asked slowly and caringly.

Gaara calmly shook his head, confirming the old man's suspicions. Gaara reached back and pulled the cork out of his gourd of sand, which instantly made Severus draw his wand. He had seen the destructive force of this boy's weapon and he wasn't about to risk letting a massacre happen right in front of him.

The sand slowly crept out of the gourd, slowly because Gaara knew he was scaring the man who had been identified as 'Severus', and didn't want to be cursed with what he could only assume was one of the wands that he had been told about by Sirius.

The sand was hovering in the air now in wavy patterns until it started to form into more discernable shapes, the shapes of letters. The letters spelt out 'Hello, my name is Gaara.'

He had to admit, this way was much easier than writing on the wall, though he imagined it would appear a little more conspicuous.

"Hello Gaara, my name is Professor Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry." Dumbledore replied to the silent teen's greeting. "Would I be correct in assuming that you're a wizard?"

'No.'

"Oh," This shocked the aging man "then, are you a squib?"

Again 'No.'

"A relative of a witch or wizard?" Albus Dumbledore was seriously unsure of what else the boy could have been. Maybe a humanoid magical creature? It would explain the eyes and the panda look.

'No.' The sand had deformed and reformed each time the same answer was given to erase any chance of confusion, but the elderly man still looked more confused than a Suna villager told that Gaara wasn't going to kill them.

'I've never been trained in magic.' Gaara formed in front of himself.

"Hmm...well; it's getting cold out here, why don't we retire inside and have something warm to eat and have a little chat." Albus motioned inside, whilst the other teachers started to wander back inside now that the matter had been resolved for now. Until only one was left. That one was Remus Lupin.

The ill looking man walked up to Gaara as they proceeded inside of the impressive castle and whispered into his ear discretely, "Don't worry, I'll tell our mutual friend what's happening." Before he turned off down a different hallway.

The red head was glad regarding this assurance. As much as he loathed his nickname, Sirius had been good to him and he did consider him as something at least resembling a friend. He still wasn't all too sure about the whole friendship thing.

Eventually Gaara's thoughts were interrupted when they arrived at a dead end in the corridor. Gaara surveyed his surroundings and saw nothing of great interest. The only thing that was different from any other hallway was the large gryphon statue set into the wall.

With a quizzical look towards the old man in front of him, Gaara continued to study the statue that was the only item of interest in the hallway, except the ancient man but he was sure he would have plenty of time to find out about him later on.

"Jelly bean." The man said out of the blue, making Gaara question the man's sanity, but fortunately the headmaster of the school was not as senile as senile as he seemed by any means as the gargoyle began to turn, magically, making a loud grinding sound of stone against stone.

"Please, follow me." The old man said as he stepped towards the hole where the statue had once stood, now replaced by the stone staircase that had spiralled upwards after the gryphon statue.

They both ascended, up the narrow staircase, until they reached a door which was immediately opened and passed through. Into the large office Gaara followed, who couldn't help but feel a slight envy at the size and magnitude of the room in comparison to the slightly bleak looking Kazekage's office.

Dumbledore had moved to the chair on the far side of the grand desk before motioning for the red-head to sit down also.

As he did, he couldn't help but notice the magnificent bird sitting on a pedestal several feet from the desk. The red and orange bird looked to be made of nothing but flames and grace. He was dragged from his thoughts by the words spoken by the only other human in the room.

"His name is Fawkes. He's a phoenix." The wise old man stated, as he too gazed at the intelligent bird.

"Now, onto more prudent matters. Mister Gaara, as I understand things, you cannot speak and you have magical potential but have never been taught, is that correct"

*Nod*

"May I ask, where are you parents?"

Gaara thought about this question, for more than one reason. Firstly, he had to think about whether to reveal that he was technically an orphan, and secondly, he had to think of an appropriate gesture to signal that they were dead after deciding to tell the truth, in part. He didn't want to use his sand to communicate every little message.

Gaara raised his hand and clenched his fist whilst his thumb was pointing outwards, then slowly he slid his thumb across his throat.

Dumbledore seemed to understand, as he said "I am sorry to hear that, as, by the looks of your clothes, you don't have anywhere else to stay. Would you like to join Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry?"

Gaara quickly shook his head. He didn't know where, in what world, he was in, but he didn't have time to be in school. Additionally, there was Sirius, who could use all the friends he could get.

"Are you sure I can't change your mind? This school is an enjoyable place to learn and a good base for whatever else you plan to do in life..."

At this, Gaara paused; this man knew more than he was letting on and it was a little unnerving. He thought for a while but finally nodded his head slowly and thoughtfully. If he attended this strange school, he could help Sirius find his godson and find a way home.

"Ah, splendid, I'll have Professor McGonagall sort out your paperwork. Term starts on the first of September so I'll arrange for one of the teachers to escort you to Diagon Alley; it's the best place to purchase your school supplies supplies." One might ask why the great and powerful Albus Dumbledore was so intent on acquiring the young boy and have him attend Hogwarts that year and the answer would be fear. Everything about this boy scared him, more than Voldemort, more than Gellert Grindelwald. He needed to know more about whatever this boy was and what his intentions were. As an added bonus, he could use him to protect Harry that year from Sirius Black, whether or not he was guilty was unimportant in the face of a threat like a serial killer after the boy-who-lived. Better safe than sorry.

"Until you go to get your supplies tomorrow, you'll be staying in one of the houses of Hogwarts" Dumbledore pressed the tip of his wand to his desk and spoke clearly " _Advoco_ Snape"

"Oh; do you want to visit your home to collect your things, Gaara?"

The Jinchūriki shook his head, wondering idly if he'd forgotten any of his personal affects in the shack; not that he could risk going back there any time soon, anyway.

Several minutes later, the door opened to reveal a clearly annoyed Snape.

"You called for me, headmaster?"

"Yes, Severus. Please show young Gaara here to the Slytherin chambers. He will be attending Hogwarts this year. Now that I think about it, how old are you Gaara?"

Gaara held up his hands and flashed his splayed hand once each signifying ten plus three fingers on one hand. Thirteen overall.

"Perfect, you will be a third year."

Snape, not bothering with any pleasantries led his unlucky-find to the cellars of the large castle before he muttered a password quietly and proceeded inside, not bothering to wait for his charge.

Inside of the hole in the wall of the grimy cellar, was much more lavish than one would have expected, but Gaara didn't show anything on his face as he continued walking after the gloomy potions master.

They arrived at a dark oak door at the end of one of the twin hallways that they had walked down. Snape inspected the name plate on the door before he opened it to reveal several royal looking black-wood beds with green and silver sheets, matching the various other curtains and tapestries as well as cupboards and wardrobes. All in all, the place looked quite liveable but for the coldness, but Gaara was all too use to sleeping in cold conditions. Quite a few windows got broken in his house.

"Goodnight." Snape said scathingly before closing the door and storming back to his own quarters to brood over the ridiculous treatment of his time by the headmaster as well as the fact that an unsorted, uneducated and possibly unhinged teenager had been admitted to the noble and sacred area of Slytherin.

Said unhinged-teenager was tired enough that he didn't even consider exploring the castle, thus he decided to undress and climb into the surprisingly warm and comfortable bed. He set his gourd down next to the bed, in case someone decided that he would be vulnerable in his sleep and attacked him. Usually the minor trek and earlier excursion he had been on wouldn't have even fazed him but after several weeks of inactivity, he seemed to have lost some muscle mass despite his small efforts.

The sand-nin went to sleep that night with one thought that quite often occurred to him as he was drifting off to sleep, how good it feels to be able to sleep.

Gaara wasn't a sound sleeper, possibly because of the many years he had gone without sleep, possibly the stark ninja training he had endured as a child, or possibly the multiple attempts against his life over the years. But whichever was the cause, Gaara was now awake. He could hear someone trying to be stealthy and sneak up on him but had obviously undergone no training. The heavy footed man, judging from the volume of the footfalls, had entered the room and was slowly making his way over to the left side of his bed. Gaara didn't even bother opening his eyes. It didn't matter who they were, the sand would protect him without fail.

The man walked up to within a metre of the bed and with a fluttering of a cloak the quiet sound of " _Stupefy_ " was spoken. As soon as the red light had started out of the wand, the cork of the gourd had popped out and the entire bed Gaara was lying in was encase in a shield of sand at least an inch or two thick.

Soon enough the intruder had left understanding that any attempt would be futile.

Gaara recalled his sand back into its storing place before turning over on the bed and going back to sleep.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Gaara awoke in the morning without prompting, and rose to a sitting position on the king-sized bed.

The perpeually tired teenager didn't take long to exit the warmth of the bed and make his way out of the room to look for the closest shower. Luckily it appeared that after every few bedroom doors, there was a clearly marked bathroom door. It seemed as if the communal showers were each for the different year groups, if the plaques on the doors were to be believed.

After a quick shower, Gaara dried himself off and redressed in his clothes before strapping the giant gourd on his back and walked towards the exit of the dormitories that led back into the dingy dungeons. He was silently thankful that he didn't need to know the password to exit it again, otherwise he would have had to wait for that bat impersonator to let him out, and he didn't like his chances living by the mercies of the clearly scornful man.

He kept walking until he came upon the stairs that would lead back up to the main body of the castle. By the trip it took to get up, he guessed that the bowels of the school that he had stayed in for the night were quite far underground, and from the decay on the roof, he used his keen ninja prowess to deduce that the entire house had been situated under the lake… his keen ninja prowess and that the windows that showed the darkened water in the morning. But mostly the prowess thing.

He finally came into a part of the vast castle that he recognised, which wasn't overly helpful as it might have just looked similar. All of the hallways looked more or less the same to the foreign teenager.

Gaara was hoping he could make it out of the castle to see Sirius again, to tell him that he would be staying at the school for the time being. Unfortunately, he couldn't find the exit, nor could he find the headmaster's office. He only found one of the hundreds of corridors lined with paintings, suits of armour and the occasional wooden door.

By the time he had been insulted by the fiftieth or so moving painting, he was beginning to get angry. He was really lost.

Tired of aimlessly wandering, he trudged over to the nearest door and opened it to reveal… a broom closet... Sighing, he went to the next one along and opened it to reveal a large classroom with many ancient looking desks and benches. At the end of the room there was a set of stair leading to an office at the back.

Gaara walked forwards, hoping that the room beyond might hold someone capable of steering him towards the exit.

He walked up the small set of steps and knocked on the door lightly. The answer came in the form of a soft voice calling through the door, "Come in," in an almost curious manner, justifiable by the fact that the only people supposed to be in Hogwarts that week were a few teachers and support staff, and none of which were usually up that early or had any business with him.

The red-head opened the creaking door and practically stumbled into the cluttered office to find a very tired looking man sitting behind a small desk littered with papers, trying desperately to finish all of his work before the first of September, unbeknownst to most, for two reasons.

Lupin looked up from his desk and smiled wearily at the apparently forever angry-looking teen standing in the doorway with his giant gourd on his back and abnormal garb along with the bandanna covering his neck.

"Good morning Lily, how may I help you?" Lupin couldn't resist joining in on his friend's joke, plus the look on the red-heads face was more amusing than an upside down Severus.

Gaara reached behind himself to remove the cork from his storage device, debating whether to answer him or give him a desert funeral. He chose the former as the sand floated out and formed the words 'Need to see Sirius,' before it dissolved and reformed as 'Tell him what's happening.' The tanuki host was seriously glad that he could use his sand like this; it would have been hell writing everything out all of the time.

"I'm afraid you can't go to see him at the moment, Gaara," Remus said with a sigh at the look of confusion on the younger's face. "I've been asked to escort you to Diagon Alley, to buy your supplies for the school year. Then you'll be staying in an inn on the Alley until you come back here," He explained. "By that time, the rest of the dementors will be guarding the grounds of Hogwarts and it will be impossible to sneak out to the Shack, especially for a student like you."

'I need to tell him about what has happened'

"How about this; before we go to buy your supplies, I'll go and meet with Sirius and tell him. I'll say I'm picking up some ingredients for a potion." Lupin smiled at his own inventiveness and the look of relief that was present on the boy's face despite his efforts to remain stoic.

'Ok,' He was about to call his sand back when a couple of thoughts crossed his mind. 'Food?'

"'Food'?" Lupin questioned the mute teen, "Oh! Breakfast! You're hungry." He exclaimed realising the boy probably hadn't eaten anything since the morning before, and from what he remembered, Sirius was never a great cook. "Just go out the door, turn left and walk to the end of the hallway, turn right and then walk until you reach the stairs. Go down two floors and then walk to the third hallway on your left and that should lead you to the Great Hall where you can get some food." It made Lupin internally laugh when he realised how complicated the directions were. He had been in the school for so long that he instinctively knew his way around better than he did his own home.

Gaara replied with a curt nod as he set off. Luckily for him, he had a great memory, being a ninja and all, so finding the Great Hall shouldn't be too difficult. Hopefully.

As the sand shinobi was about to walk out of the office's door, he turned back and let his sand change into words that made Remus laugh uproariously. 'Call me Lily again and I'll make you eat all of the sand in this gourd.'

Gaara dawdle on his way to the 'Great Hall', being too hungry to take time to glare at the rude paintings. That being said, when he arrived he did take a moment to admire the splendor of the hall. He had to admit, the name fit.

Inside of the expansive room were several long dining tables that ran side by side, and a slightly shorter one that ran horizontally at the other end of the hall. The roof, the little that could be seen, showed many elaborate crossbeams that were, for the most part, hidden by what looked like the sky. It was, for lack of a better term, enchanting. On the walls on either side of him, Gaara looked at the banners that were hung from the ceiling to a few meters above the floor, that displayed what he guessed were to represent the four houses of Hogwarts.

The only other people in the hall looked almost surprised to see him enter. It was an aging stern-looking woman in green robes and a stereotypical witch hat, who he recognised from the night before; a giant, messy looking man with a black bushy beard and hair that seemed to encompass most of his head and face, who seemed to recognise him from somewhere; finally in the centre of the table, in the fanciest chair, sat the headmaster of the school. Unlike the other two, Dumbledore seemed to awake from the surprise first, as he gestured for the smallish teen to come forwards, towards them.

Gaara came forwards until he was standing only a few meters in front the dark wood table.

"Good morning, Gaara." Dumbledore chimed as he looked at the boy before him with his ever calculating blue eyes.

Gaara nodded in return, not bothering to use his sand to reply.

"This is the boy I was telling you about earlier, Minerva," Albus said to the stern woman. "Gaara, this is the deputy headmistress and professor of Transfiguration, Professor McGonagall." Gesturing to his right, and to his left, "This is Rubeus Hagrid, keeper of keys and grounds at Hogwarts and, starting this year, will be teaching Care of Magical Creatures." The large man smiled warmly at Gaara.

"I imagine you must be hungry," The elderly wizard commented, as he raised his hands and clapped them together, causing a variety of breakfast foods to appear on the nearest table, close to the front.

Gaara eventually happily sat and ate the delicious food, being cautious when he first tried pumpkin juice to check for poisons. Although the food was good, so very good compared to the 'food' Sirius prepared for him, it couldn't hold a candle to his sister, Temari's cooking, back in Sunagakure.

The entire meal was eaten in silence, after which the sickly Professor Lupin walked in through the back entrance to the hall with a nervous smile on his face and sweat on his brow. Gaara assumed he'd gone as quickly as he could, to explain Gaara's situation to Black and had, just as quickly, rushed back.

After Gaara had waited for the man to finish his breakfast, he was asked to follow him to the headmaster's office along with the current owner of the office.

When they had stepped into the office, the two professors walked to the unlit fire place and looked expectantly at Gaara. Gaara in turn, walked towards them apprehensively, prompting an explanation from Lupin. "Today we'll be traveling by floo. I assume you haven't used floo before." He said "All you need to do, is pick up some of the floo-powder in the pot and clearly say-" that was when Lupin stopped dead in his tracks, realising that the boy lacked the ability to speak, thus couldn't use floo-powder.

"Oh; headmaster, Gaara here can't speak, so what should we do? He can't just write the address," Lupin said, hoping for a quicker solution than taking the Hogwarts express to London.

"Don't worry, Remus; just walk to the outskirts of the grounds and Apparate the both of you straight to London, but be careful of the Dementors."

"Thank you, headmaster."

After a few parting words between the professor and the headmaster, the pair exited the office and walked to the Slytherin dormitory area, where Gaara deposited his sand after much coercion and reassurance from the teacher. The next stop was a grassy clearing quite a ways away from the castle; where, upon arrival, Lupin took a hold of the Jinchuriki's shoulder. Gaara didn't know what to expect, or what 'Apparating' was, but nothing anyone could have said could have quite prepared him for the disagreeable sensation of traveling by Apparition. It was in no way, even close to as bad as the technique that had brought him to that world, but still wasn't pleasant. The feeling of being pulled in every direction whilst simultaneously being squeezed in all of the same directions. Needless to say, Gaara barely landed on his feet.

"Very impressive, most don't land so elegantly after their first time," Lupin chuckled as he led the slightly peeved teen into a grotty pub called 'The Leaky Cauldron'. Inside of the dingy bar, were a multitude of robed men and women that the trained teen immediately identified as wizards and witches by their attire and the sensation they emitted, like chakra but more focussed and controlled, though unknowingly it would appear.

The pale teacher didn't stop for pleasantries as he walked straight through the crowded pub, not earning so much as a second glance, which was more than could be said for the red-haired, tattooed, ninja garb wearing, scowling, scary teenager following him. Gaara was well versed in the art of ignoring the judging masses, but it was refreshing to be judged for what he looked like and not for what he had inside of him.

Just outside the back door was a narrow area with a tall, red brick wall that seemed to be about the most interesting thing there.

Remus removed his wand from his robes and tapped one of the bricks, causing them to make a grinding noise. Gaara wasn't expecting the large gateway to form as the bricks moved and turned out, revealing a bustling high-street that put Hogsmeade to shame in most ways.

"Please, follow me and stick close. Can't have you getting lost here can we. I heard there is a mass murderer on the loose," The scarred man laughed as he proceeded onwards into the crowd. Every few moments he would look back to check if his charge was still following him. Diagon Alley always got really busy in the last few days before the start of the school term. It just so happened that that very day was the busiest day of the year. Luck shines on us all.

Lupin waded through the crowd until he reached an obscure marble building, covered in pillars that seemed to bulge outwards in the middle from the weight of the roof. The inside of the bank was quieter than outside but that didn't make it any less interesting for Gaara as he first saw the strange creatures walking across the floor with scowls almost as prominent as his own. The pink skinned, pointy eared, squat creatures all wore a kind of surreal banker's uniform.

Remus, after waiting in line with Gaara, led him towards the towering desk manned by one of the odd midgets. Lupin, like any learned wizard, usually would have warned the boy about the Goblin's viscous temperaments but as the chance of the boy saying something insulting was fairly low, he didn't bother. He just wanted to get the money and leave as soon as possible.

They removed some funds from one of Hogwarts' many vaults with a signed letter from Dumbledore, to pay for Gaara's various expenses. By the looks of sack of gold that had been removed, Gaara surmised that it wasn't going to be cheep.

The first stop on their tour of Diagon Alley was Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions, which, as the name suggested, was where the ninja was going to purchase his new clothes. If he was honest, Gaara didn't really want to give up his normal attire, but as he had been told by Lupin that the uniform was absolutely mandatory and if he didn't wear it, he couldn't attend the school.

They both entered into the shop but Lupin hung back by the entrance and let Gaara get on with it, knowing that the cold boy wouldn't appreciate someone looking over his shoulder or holding his hand.

Gaara walked through the cluttered shop whilst he tried to gain a worker's attention. It wasn't, easy as they seemed preoccupied with cutting the various fabrics and cloths around the store or walking into the back of the shop for whatever reason.

Eventually, due to his attempts at waving and tapping gently on the desks, one of the older workers looked around and saw him standing there. It was then he realised the fault in his plan, the fact that he couldn't talk. It seemed he had underestimated how troublesome the 'mute' thing would be. As she looked and waited for Gaara to ask for something, the woman started to look annoyed, judging by the glower forming on her face.

"Yes? What do you want?" She was getting steadily more annoyed by Gaara's impudent silence. "Look, if you're just going to waste-"

"I'm very sorry, my young friend here can't speak," Lupin interjected, feeling terribly guilty that he'd forgotten to help the disabled Gaara. "He's here to purchase a full set of third year robes for school."

"I'm so sorry, I didn't know." The woman flustered whilst trying to change the subject "Hogwarts?"

"Yes, please."

"Please step this way," She gestured to behind a curtain that led to the back of the store, presumably where they would do the measuring and/or fittings. He was right, by the looks of the podiums standing in the middle of the room and the few workers who buzzed around, one or two of them attending to the boy currently standing on one of the podiums. He looked unhappier to be there than Gaara did. Every few moments he would snap at one of the workers for the most miniscule infraction or mistake. Gaara couldn't help but agree, he hated clothes shopping as well.

The woman moved over to another podium and gestured for Gaara to step onto it so his measurements could be taken. The mute wasn't too thrilled but did not make much of a fuss. When he was at the proper height the woman walked over to one of the various tables and picked up a measuring tape. She moved in front of Gaara and dropped one end of the measuring device so that it was fully stretched out before she removed her wand and flicked it at the tape. Soon after, the instrument flew in the air and began to slither and wave like a snake, before it started to measure the peeved teen.

As the tape measure worked and woman walked around the store searching for the materials needed, Gaara looked over to the only other current customer. The moody teen was about his height, a little taller, with slicked back platinum-blonde hair, that's right, you know him, you love to hate him, the one, the only…Draco Malfoy.

The upper-class teen looked over to the even stranger red-head and was duty-bound to introduce himself, in case the boy was someone important or their son. "Hello, my name is Draco Malfoy. And you are?"

Gaara now understood the key difference between him and the other; he wasn't a brat…anymore.

Malfoy continued to look over at the other expectantly, waiting for a reply, hoping for someone with powerful connections and not another mudblood, half-blood or blood-traitor. Soon after the question was posed, Draco was becoming agitated by the other's silence.

"I asked what your name was," He said trying his best not to shout or lose his composure.

Gaara looked just as annoyed as him but didn't shout or even talk; he just reached up to the strange bandanna thing around his neck and pulled it down slightly to reveal a large recently healed scar over his throat.

"Oh, I apologize," Draco said graciously, for him, "Are you from a pure-blooded family?" He needed to know whether it was even worth his time talking to someone who might be as worthless as a mudblood or a blood traitor like the Weasley, and by the looks of his clothes, he might not be far off the mark.

Gaara had to think for a minute about the question. Pure blood? Could he be referring to his class? In which case he would definitely be pure-blooded, coming from a long line of prominent shinobi and a Kage for a father. After he had taken his time thinking about his non-verbal answer he nodded his head slowly.

If Draco was honest with himself he would have had to admit that he wouldn't have guessed the other teenager's status but was glad nonetheless. The look on the stranger's face was scarier than his father's had ever been, and looked like it could get much worse so the chances were good that he wouldn't be as annoying as some of the supposed pure-bloods he knew.

"You're all done, Mr Malfoy. You can go now; we'll send your robes to your address. Thank you again." The seamstress said as he helped him down from the podium and went to one of the tables and started writing notes of some description.

"Well, I guess I'll see you later," Malfoy said before exiting the shop, completely ignoring Lupin who was more than happy to continue to wait and daydream.

"What house are you, dear?" The woman, who had since returned and removed the measuring tape, asked. Gaara shrugged. The woman wrote something down in her notebook before asking "Is there any particular type of robes you need or do you want a full set?" As she went back to her little notepad she the seemed to remember something before raising her head again "I'm so sorry!" She seemed flustered "Do you need a full set?" Gaara nodded, thankful she realised he was limited to yes or no questions. "Okay, I have all of your measurements. Please come back in about-" At this, the woman looked over at a clock in the corner of the room, "four hours."

Gaara once again nodded before he walked towards the door and waited for Remus to realise that he was about to leave without the man dreaming idly of steak. It wasn't too long before Lupin finished his inner musings and stood up, "Thank you very much, we'll come back at four."

"Shall we continue?" He asked rhetorically as they walked on, into the crowds with Gaara walking besides him. Instead of the comfortable silence that Gaara had enjoyed before, this time Lupin kept making a one-sided conversation about his past. He kept talking about his group of friends, the 'Marauders' and how one of them got married to a girl called Lily, for which Gaara got his despised nickname. How only one had had a son and he had become famous for killing a dark wizard, a boy named Harry who Sirius had been trying to meet with. Over the course of the walk, Lupin had even revealed his and his friend's nicknames. From what Sirius had told Lupin, he could definitely trust Gaara and it felt so great to relive and retell some of the adventures him and his friends had in their youth. By the time they had reached their next destination, Gaara wished he could reply to some of the tales that had been woven along the way, his reply would be "Shut up!"

They visited Pottage's Cauldrons before they stopped off at Slug & Jiggers Apothecary for Gaara's potion supplies. What made that leg of the journey that was school shopping, unbearable was the smell in the potions supply shop. It was comparable to rotting eggs and some other mystery smells that made Gaara wish he'd eaten a bigger breakfast to throw up in order to make the point that the shop was unbearably bad smelling more clear. Luckily for Gaara, it seemed as if Lupin was having an even more difficult time in the shop as he quickly zoomed around the smelly store before purchasing the correct ingredients and zooming back out. Gaara was happy enough to zoom out along with him.

The next stop was a book shop by the name of Florish & Blotts, which had been a slightly more enjoyable trip as the shop keeper's assistant had looked close to tears when Lupin had read out the last book on the list, 'The Monster Book of Monsters'.

The stop that both Gaara and Lupin had been anticipating the most was upon them as Gaara looked up at the sign above the door saying 'Ollivanders: Makers of Fine Wands since 382 B.C'. They stepped into the empty shop; the only things in there were the endless boxes that seemed to be part of the walls. Before either had time to inspect the boxes more closely, an old man peered from behind the counter and said "Remus Lupin, it has been some time since I last saw you here. And…" At this the old white haired man seemed to become confused. "I'm sorry; may I ask what your name is?"

Lupin also looked confused. It was a well known and universally accepted fact that Ollivander always knew peoples' names and never forgot any wand he made or sold, but the fact that the boy in front of him had the man stumped was odd.

"His name is Lil-Gaara," Remus managed to catch himself before he called Gaara a girl's name again, however funny his reactions were.

"If you would, please raise you wand arm." It didn't take a genius to realise he meant his dominant arm, so Gaara did and for the second time that day a tape measure took his measurements without anyone holding it. The old man known as Ollivander went into the back of the shop and came back out carrying a small purple box. He pulled away the measuring tape and opened the box and presented the wand inside to the red-head. The red-head took the long slender stick and gave it a wave. Absolutely nothing happened. The old man took the wand back with a frown on his face before going back into the many stacks of wand boxes and came back with three or four more boxes. Gaara tried each of the wands inside of the boxes and the same happened each time, not a thing.

"Mr. Lupin, are you sure this boy isn't a squib?" The perplexed shop owner asked.

"Quite sure,"

With a "hmm", he went back and brought a massive range of different coloured boxes, most were different shapes and or sizes. Gaara tried each of the wands he was presented with, not sure what to expect, if anything.

"Very strange, I've never encountered such a difficult young wizard" The old man was honestly stumped.

"Really? I could've sworn I tried twice as many wands before I got the right one." Lupin said. remembering the number of broken windows and singed eyebrows.

"Very true, I specifically remember a number of destroyed chairs that day," The man seemed to be reminiscing "but in almost every one of the wands you tried, you got a reaction, even if it was a little adverse. With young mister Gaara here, there hasn't been a single reaction."

Ollivander sighed and walked back into the piles and came back with as many wands he could carry, not long after. Gaara gave each of the little sticks a wave before more were presented to him.

"I just don't know what to say, I'm afraid. The only thing I could suggest would be for Mister Gaara to come into the back and try to find one himself. The wand chooses the wizard, so with any luck he might be able to find the one that has chosen him, and if not…well, if not then he'll have to look somewhere else for a wand because I don't know what else to suggest." Ollivander sighed as he sat down on the chair in the corner of the room and gestured for Gaara to go ahead and look around.

The racoon-monster-host walked past the dusty counter and among the endless boxes. He tried to guess, taking down a few random boxes, but still nothing worked. An idea then popped into the ninja's head. He closed his eyes and tried, using his chakra, to search for anything that would correspond. It didn't take more than a second to sense the presence of something off. Something that shouldn't have been. He couldn't put his finger on what was so off about what he was sensing but he did know where he could find it.

Gaara walked to the very furthest wall of wand boxes in the back of the store and started to remove them as quickly as possible. He dug through them until he reached the last layer of boxes that seemed to be made of old and rotten wood instead of the cardboard the newer ones were made of. Gaara reached in and picked out one of those ancient boxes. He didn't open it immediately, instead he walked back to the front of the shop to find both the adults were in silence and obviously interested to see how it turned out.

Gaara walked into the customer section of the shop and laid the old box on the counter before carefully opening the the fragile lid. Inside was a simple black wand. The boy picked up the wand and the first thing he noticed was the compatibility he felt. The shape of the wand seemed perfect for his hand and not to mention the way his chakra flowed straight into it. Gaara gave the wand a flick like he had been told to before, and to the two adult's surprise, this time something happened. When the wand had been flicked a sudden burst of wind flew through the wand shop like a hurricane, throwing everything into disarray.

After the old man had righted himself and managed to order his thoughts he said, "Well, this is a surprise. I haven't had a reaction this strong in years. And to that wand no less," he walked around to the back of the counter and picked up his own wand. He then started to use his wand to make the hundreds of boxes and papers fly back into place all around him and the others.

"What is so special about that wand?" The ever-sickly looking professor asked as he also righted his tie and jacket.

"I have no idea. I honestly don't know what is in that wand. The wands in the back of the shop were made a long time before me. Though, from the looks of where young Gaara found that particular wand, it looks like it could be from the founder of this shop's original collection." He said as he continued the massive clean-up.

"How much will that be then?" Lupin asked as he reached into the bag ready to pay for the apparently antique wand.

Ollivander raised his hand to steady Lupin, "Please, this one will be on the house. I have never sold one of the wands from the very back of the store. To be able to have sold one of the original wands is a rare treat indeed, so I'll let you have it for free."

Gaara hadn't been listening to any of the conversation that was going on, as he was fixated on the black wand in his hand. The way it seemed to fit perfectly into the contours of his hand and the way his chakra and the chakra supplied by Shukaku was absorbed into the wood was almost as comforting as his trusted gourd full of sand.

"Thank you very much." Lupin said as he walked towards the door. Gaara bowed in respect to the strange man before exiting the shop with the wand that had been put in one of his pockets. On the way to the next stop Lupin continued his endless talk about his past and friends, but for some reason he seemed to leave a few key facts out. Like the reason he was discriminated against and why they were called Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs.

The rest of the shopping expedition went without incident, for the most part, after which they picked up Gaara's robes. When they arrived back at the Leaky Cauldron, Sabaku no Gaara was more than just a little happy that he didn't have to go school shopping again for a very long time.

"Remus! Could I interest you in a drink?" Tom the bartender and landlord, asked whilst pouring another customer a pint.

Lupin seemed to consider the offer before looking down at the bags in his hands and then at Gaara before turning back to the barman and politely refusing the offer and asking for a room for a few days. The key was given to Lupin before it was passed on to Gaara. Lupin then took Gaara off to one side and said quietly, "I'm going to leave you here for a few days whilst I finish preparations for this year. I'll also talk to Padfoot for you until you get the chance to see him. I'll come back on the first of September and ride the Hogwarts express with you."

With a curt nod from Gaara, Lupin departed out of the door and left Gaara to take all of his luggage to his room. He wouldn't have left any regular student on their own in a pub for the better part of a week, he was far too responsible for that sort of behaviour, but Gaara was far from normal and Lupin was sure that he could take care of himself for a few days.

After Gaara had dumped all of his baggage onto the floor, he decided to start reading some of the easier books he had been given. He was going to wait to read the Monster Book of Monsters; it had given the shop owner enough trouble to dissuade him from trying to open it without help, or at least without his sand.

It was a little known fact that Gaara liked to read. Many wouldn't believe that the psychopath would have liked to crack open a book, but over the years he had a lot of free time. When he was very young, his father had trained him to be a ninja but after Yashamaru died and the Kazekage sent numerous assassins to kill him, he was left with the limited time he spent doing missions and the miniscule time he spent training, occupied, leaving him with so much time to fill. He didn't even sleep, so he was left with massive amounts of time. He had taken up reading early on and could easily read a book within a few hours.

The rest of that day was spent reading, until Gaara was feeling hungry, at which point he decided to go down and get some dinner. Fortunately, Lupin had had the foresight to ask for meals included with the room. Otherwise he might have had to go without eating for the week. He'd done it before and it wasn't fun. Like the time Temari had gone on a solo mission and Kankuro had been left to cook.

Downstairs was irritably noisier than in his room, Gaara decided, as he entered the crowded eating area. The black-eye-rimmed boy walked up to the bar and asked for something simple to eat. Tom said it would be done in a few minutes and just to wait by one of the tables. Easier said than done when the only space available was next to very rowdy family of red-heads laughing, shouting and joking making the teen shudder in disdain.

The red head sat down on one of the benches and tried to relax, which wasn't an easy task when the girl next to him kept raving about a newspaper and some boy. It was unbearable. At least, he thought, he didn't have to acknowledge them. That luxury didn't last long. "Hello, I'm Ginny Weasley," The younger girl beside him had turned to face him and seemed to be studying him and his odd appearance.

A minute or so passed before the girl started to look unsure of herself and then another minute of Gaara looking back at her with his ever calm face before she blurted out "S-sorry, I didn't mean to b-bother you." The emotional girl seemed to be close to tears by this point.

Before Gaara could do anything to calm the cry-baby girl down a pair of similarly red-headed twins walked up to where Gaara and Ginny were sitting and leant down with dark frowns on their face. "Oy! What-" One of the identical boys started aggressively.

"-did you say-" The second boy continued the sentence with just as much aggression in his tone.

"-to our little-"

"-sister?"

"You jerk." The first one finished the tirade.

Gaara realised that he couldn't always use his sand or write down his words, so he would have to repeat this one gesture very often. He raised his hand towards his neck, covered still by his forehead protector, and pulled down the neckwear slightly to reveal the visible scar that stretched across his throat.

"Oh,"

"Oh,"

"Oh," The three said before they all apologized sheepishly to the mute boy. Said mute boy had hoped that when that episode was over, he could go back to thinking quietly but it seemed that the event had drawn the attention of the others at the table. They all appeared to be of the same family and there were quite a few of them. Now that he looked closely, he noticed that at least one person wasn't of the same clan, by the looks of the brown bushy-haired girl.

"Ginny, Fred, George, stop bothering the poor boy," The woman, who Gaara assumed to be their mother, scolded.

"I'm sorry, dear," She said as she smiled at him from her seat on the opposite side of the table. Quickly, Gaara waved off any worries she might have had and then turned back and started to stare into the blank space in front of him. At that point, he was trying to think of any possible clues he had seen or heard to help him get him home but as of yet he hadn't thought of any that could be of use.

Gaara thoughts were interrupted when his dinner arrived, which he ate without any thought. It was good, but he just wanted to get back to reading. It was a good distraction from the world.

After he had finished the meal, he deposited the plate on the counter he had been told to and walked back upstairs, dodging a rat and the evil looking cat chasing after it. When he arrived upstairs he could already hear the indignant yelling of a boy and the reply, equally if not louder than the initial shout from a girl, not the one he had been talking to, or to put it correctly, had been talking to him.

The rest of the night continued much the same as the day had, him reading through the books he had been given and wishing he had brought some of his sand with him. He had managed to get a few hours sleep that first night before resuming his reading the second day. He became so engrossed in it that he skipped breakfast and lunch without realising.

When he finally emerged from his room and went to eat, he spotted the family of red heads, plus the brown haired girl, sitting at the largest table, except this time there was also a black haired boy wearing glasses sitting next to the brown haired girl and the youngest looking red headed male.

Gaara tried to skirt around the table so he could avoid the noisy irritants, no matter how well meaning they may have been. Gaara had been trying to become a warmer and kinder person since his fateful encounter with the blonde Hokage-wannabe in his world but he had already made a friend in Sirius and maybe even Lupin so he didn't see why he needed to socialize with the loud people. Two friends was plenty.

As he was about to sit down on one of the smaller tables in the corner of the room, he was spotted by the mother who shouted over to him and asked him to join them for dinner. He tried for a weak smile and a polite silent refusal but she wouldn't have it and insisted for him to sit with her family.

He immediately regretted not disappearing when he was assaulted by the woman's questions about his eating habits and how skinny he looked. He suffered through it for ten minutes before she moved on to the even skinnier black haired boy sitting directly across from him.

"Mum, who's 'e?" The young ginger boy asked with a little food still in his mouth.

"Ronald, don't speak with your mouth full!" She scolded, she seemed to do that a lot.

"So, what's your name? I'm Ron Weasley." He said after swallowing his food and offering his hand out to Gaara to shake. He reluctantly did so, but did not verbally reply. Fortunately, before a repeat of yesterday happened the bushy brown haired girl spoke up.

"He can't speak Ron. We met him yesterday, remember?" She pointed out. He had indeed been there but he had apparently been too engrossed in his conversation to notice the slight altercation that had occurred.

Whilst he silently ate his food, Gaara couldn't help but notice the glasses wearing boy across from him. Something seemed to claw at his memory, other than Shukaku, something important that he should remember. He couldn't have met the boy before so why did he seem to ring a bell. His head snapped up in realisation. The glasses, the black hair, the slightly nerdy look and the almost hidden scar on the forehead. Sirius and Lupin had told him about Sirius' godson, and their good friend James' son, Harry Potter, called the-boy-who-lived.

That night, the Gaara's thoughts were drawn back to Sirius again; worry was at the forefront, closely followed by curiosity regarding the convict's recent activities, and the smallest was the constant loathing for the nickname that he had created for Gaara. The last thing he needed was people patronising him. It was almost as bad as Temari's behaviour towards him, doting on him and hugging him all the time. It somehow made him reminisce fondly about his serial killer days when even she wouldn't hug him or pat him on the head and laugh about how short and cute her baby brother was. It was a simpler time.

The next day was August the thirty-first and the last day he would spend in the leaky cauldron. It went much the same as the days that had passed before, except at about six in the evening, there came a tapping, as if someone was gently rapping, rapping at his chamber door, the red-head stood and opened the door, hoping beyond hope it wasn't one of the Weasley party, or a raven. The Weasleys were nice enough, just kind of annoying in their informal and rambunctious ways. To his relief, there stood Remus Lupin, looking much the same as he had when Gaara had last seen him, if a little paler and more sickly.

"Good morning Lily," He greeted cheerily, walking into the room, currently littered with open books and other items strewn out across the floor. Gaara wasn't a very tidy little ninja. "It's a bit messy in here," He stated, trying his best not to look the mute boy in the eyes for fear of his death glare.

"I thought I would stay here for tonight and then we'd go to the train station early tomorrow." He smiled. "So, have you been reading all of this time?" Lupin asked as he looked over some of the books scattered around the room.

Gaara nodded as he sat back down on the floor and picked up the book he had previously been reading, something called 'History of Hogwarts', or something like that, he didn't care about the title.

That night, the pair went down to eat later than usual, as Lupin had been filling the tanuki boy in on Sirius' activities. Which had included and were pretty much limited to: eating, hunting, running, sleeping and the one oddity was his trip to see Harry, Sirius' godson, which had ultimately been unsuccessful as he had only gotten a glimpse of the boy before he was taken by the Knight Bus to where they were now. As they went down later, they managed to avoid the loud people that would undoubtedly have been eating there earlier.

That night, Gaara had been kicked out of his bed and had to sleep on the floor. He didn't complain, he couldn't, but he wouldn't have, as he could see how sick the man was, but he still pouted as he turned restlessly on the hard wooden floor. Fortunately he was used to worse but still, he pouted.

In the morning, the sleepy man was awoken by a shake of his shoulder and opened his eyes to see the blazing red of one of his best friend's wife's hair; still not fully awake he said, "Morning Lily, where's James," It was a few seconds later that his eyes fully focussed and he saw the incredibly peeved teen standing above him. It was an unsettling sight. "Sorry, thought you were someone else," He laughed nervously as he sat up and started getting ready for the long day ahead and the even longer night that it promised.

Little did Lupin know, Gaara also hated full moons, as it was the night when Shukaku was at his strongest. He was able to fend off the demon and keep control of his mind these days but it still promised to be a long night.

After breakfast they left the Leaky Cauldron, Gaara carrying his trunk and other school supplies. They took a taxi to King's Cross Station. The station was packed as always and Gaara even noticed some of the more obvious wizards walking around, trying to get on the train earlier so they could get a seat. He really saw no reason not to get there earlier so there was no chance of missing the train, but he had always had trouble understanding civilians.

They walked to one of the barriers, dividing the platforms nine and ten. Lupin bent down and whispered into Gaara's ear, to avoid someone over hearing, "Follow me, and walk fast." As soon as he had finished speaking he had walked briskly towards the barrier and without even blinking he walked straight through it. No matter how much magic he saw, Gaara still wasn't used to it. Ninjutsu seemed so much more sensical. Gaara also didn't flinch as he passed through the barrier, through the proverbial Looking-Glass, and into the hidden platform 9¾.

They secured an empty compartment on the train and sat opposite each other, next to the windows. Soon after sitting down, Remus had fallen asleep, and Gaara wasn't far away. He tried to stay awake by watching the influx of students walking by his window but soon he too pulled a blanket out of his trunk and over himself and went to the peaceful realm of dreams.

Unbeknownst to him or Professor Lupin, about half an hour after he started to slumber, three third year students entered into their compartment and sat down. They conversed quietly for a few hours under the onslaught of the heavy winds and rain until the train came to an abrupt halt. The trio looked out of the window to see only the darkness and the rain and the frost slowly covering their window.

Ghostly shadows drifted in the corridors of the train and one of them stopped by one of the compartment doors, sensing the delectable soul that lay within. It unlocked the door and reached around to grab it, sliding it out of the way. No matter what orders the dementor of Azkaban had been given, the feast within the compartment would be worth it. It floated into the cabin and reached out its hand towards, not Harry Potter, but the sleeping Sabaku no Gaara. It reached forwards and just as its hand grazed the light covering the blanket provided…


	2. A New School

 

Just as the rotting black hand reached out to remove the covering of the human with the soul more tempting than a hundred Azkaban inmates, the blanket was thrown to the side of the compartment revealing a very awake and predictably angry Sabaku no Gaara, brandishing a kunai, the only weapon he had been able to smuggle with him to Diagon Alley. The dark metal blade glinted in the pale light left by sun trying desperately to shine through the thick and dark storm clouds overhead. When the evil creature recovered from its shock, if that was what that behaviour could be described as, it started forward again to take the massive soul within the container in front of it. As the monster approached Gaara, even he felt the slightest effects as he was made to relive even the most brutal of his killings when he was a child, but that did not stop him from throwing the kunai straight at where he assumed the creature’s heart would have been. Unfortunately the dagger struck the folds of the black cloak as if it was empty and soon hit the ground making a quiet clanging sound, all but ignored as Gaara backed away from the creature, having nothing left to defend himself with, that wouldn’t also harm the others in the compartment. He didn’t even have his armour of sand on, because he had been reluctant to wear it when he travelled to Diagon Alley as it might have been too heavy to transport with him when apparating, he didn’t quite know how the whole “apparating” technique worked.

 

One of the mangled bony hands moved to Gaara’s cheek and, almost tenderly, embraced it as the dementor leaned in to kiss the boy. It opened its circular ‘mouth’ and started to suck the very soul out of the shinobi. All of a sudden Gaara could feel every ounce of his chakra being consumed right from his mouth. His very essence was being eaten. And that was when it got really interesting for the other passengers of the train compartment.

 

The chakra that had been absorbed by the creature was replaced so quickly by more and more chakra, which was getting progressively wilder and increasingly violent. It was as if the devil himself was fuelling the soul of the boy being kissed by the dementor. The shadowy figure started to spasm as it continued taking in the boy’s soul until it was shaken off by its own wild movements. It looked, to all present, as if it had overloaded on the spirit of the red-headed mute and was having a fit. But it didn’t end with the jerking, as the creature started to dissolve into pitch black sand from the bottom upwards. The entire dementor was soon nothing more than a pile of black dust on the train compartment’s floor.

 

Gaara understood exactly what had happened as he had felt everything, and was unaffected in the slightest as he sat back down and pulled a small book out of his pocket and resumed reading from where he had left off. He had felt the creature absorb his chakra, the essence of his soul, until, in a bid to protect his host, Shukaku had released its own chakra. This caused the monster to absorb too much of the demon’s soul and subsequently died returning the absorbed chakra to the original owner. As his chakra had been returned he was more or less unaffected by the ordeal and wanted nothing more than to relax for the rest of the train journey. Gaara wouldn’t have been a worthwhile ninja if he hadn’t been able to cope with something like that, in his opinion.             

 

The rest of the cabin, on the other hand, were shocked, including Remus Lupin, who had woken up halfway through the encounter, to see Gaara being kissed by a dementor before the magical creature…disappeared. Before he could make any kind of comment or form a coherent question, the familiar presence was felt again by the doorway. An exact duplicate of the previous grim creature floated in, but this time it flew straight towards Harry Potter who fainted not long after it took an interest in him. At this, Lupin flew from his seat and shouted “ _Expecto Patronum_!” And out of the end of his extended wand came a white mist that seemed to engulf the dementor. The grim-reaper look-alike flew out of the cabin, faster than a kyubi-host towards ramen, and wasn’t seen again. A few minutes later the train’s power seemed to spark back into life and the motionless train started again towards its destination.

 

The last couple of hours of the train journey were spent reviving the unconscious Potter, giving the red-headed mystery teen (Gaara) wary glances; and, although reluctantly for some, changing into the school’s mandatory uniform. Gaara had only been persuaded to put them on when Lupin, who was on his way out of the compartment to check on the other students after the dementor inspection, said, in response to Gaara glaring at the uniform he had pulled out of his bag, that otherwise he would be expelled before the term officially started, creating a new school record, and stopping Gaara from researching any possible methods to get home. The uniform itself was a big change from his normal attire. The constricting school-code trousers were bad enough, they would make running more difficult, but the shirt, tie and jumper were ridiculous. They were impractical in every physical sense. He was just glad he was allowed to wear his own clothes on the weekend. He hadn’t asked or anything, he couldn’t, but he didn’t care, he wouldn’t wear the hated school uniform on his days off. The clothes only saving grace was that the robes would be an ideal place to hide weapons. Of course, he also strapped on his trusty leather band under his cloak which would soon carry his patented gourd again. He’d like to see someone try to take it from him then.

 

When the train finally came to a halt it was still pouring down outside and was probably going to start to get dark soon, though that was more or less irrelevant as the clouds covered any trace of the sun. Gaara was reluctant to exit the train with the rest of the student body as he looked at the water with disdain. He hated getting wet, and always had, for one reason or another. Eventually when all of the other people behind him grew impatient and started to hurl insults at him, he walked out into the wet train-station platform. All of the other students were walking towards the carriages, so the newcomer followed suit, ignoring all of the smaller children who were marching towards the lake. He walked with the crowd, scaring everyone out of his path with a stare colder than the icy rain falling all around them, until he reached the stage coaches.

 

As he walked up to the ancient looking black carriages, the first thing he noticed, other than they were ancient and black, were the creatures pulling them. They looked like a horse had mated with a bat. They were the size and roughly the same shape as one their equine counterparts but looked deathly bony and thin, as if their bones were only covered in a thin layer of black skin and a pair of folded bat wings. Their eyes were one of the most haunting facets of their appearance as they were completely and deathly white, pale, much like the Byakugan of Konoha. One of the strangest things about the odd creatures was that none of the other students around him seemed to pay them any mind as they boarded their carriages. Gaara also tried to pay as little heed as possible, as he walked up to the last carriage and stepped in.

 

Inside of the dry and warm carriage sat three people, all roughly his age and one of which he had met previously. The one he knew had identified himself as Draco Malfoy a few days prior. The carriages had two adjacent seats and could comfortably hold two or three people each. Malfoy was sat on one side and the two large boys were sat on the other. That was before Gaara stepped into the vehicle. As soon as his scarlet head popped through the doorway both of the goons snapped to attention and looked as if they were about to start some sort of a fight, before they were calmed by a wave of the platinum-blonde’s hand. Said blonde, waved them to sit on his side of the carriage, much to Gaara’s inner relief as he sat down opposite the trio. His relief came from the notion of having to sit between the two obese teens for what was sure to be a lengthy ride, if his luck was anything to go by or to have to sit facing them whilst sitting next to the snob, an almost equally undesirable thought. Of course, had they not moved, he would have moved them one way or another. His composure could only go so far.     

  

“We met in the robe shop, as I’m sure you’ll remember” Draco started the conversation with his normal confident and superior smirk. A nod from Gaara confirmed his hope as the aristocrat continued to talk about how he was sure Gaara already knew there were certain types of people that deserved respect without earning it and certain people that didn’t, the certain people that did deserve the respect apparently deserved it just because of their lineage. It was times like these that he wished he could talk, because he would have verbally beaten the boy in front of him worse than the kunoichi Tsunade after finding her fellow Sannin Jiraiya peeping on her, though his would be strictly verbal rather than a physical beating. Instead he had to settle for nodding on occasion to the seemingly rehearsed speech and ignoring him as much as he could.

 

Eventually the time came when his input was required “Don’t you think we should just cast out all of the mud-bloods from Hogwarts?” Asked Draco as he fixed Gaara with what some might have described as an intense stare. What was returned would universally be described as a _real_ intense stare. It scared all three of the non-shinobis senseless, and then amidst the intimidation, Gaara slowly but surely shook his head meaning a resounding ‘No’.

 

For the rest of the ride, the three Slytherins attempted to fight back with weak glares but it was nothing compared to the tried-&-tested glare of the demon container of Suna.

 

When they arrived at the school itself, the three from the carriage scuttled off before Gaara walked out, and followed the others through the main entrance and on to the great hall. The dining hall was as grand as it had been the last time he was there, though his admiration of the dining room was diminished by the number of scrambling students running to their tables. It left Gaara wondering if he should just sit at the end of the table like last time, but quickly dismissed the thought as the area was abruptly flooded by children. Deciding to forgo the trouble of finding a seat he crossed his arms and moved to the back of the enormous room and leaned against the warm stone wall. He watched the continuing chaos for several minutes until they had all finally been seated and were engrossed in quieter conversations. Soon after the main pandemonium of returning to the school had ended for most of the students, a group made their way to the front from one of the four tables and arranged themselves to face the rest of the student body with one boy at the front supporting a sizeable toad that made Gaara think back to the largest toad he had ever seen, then again, that toad had also had a pipe in his mouth and was about the same size as the castle he was currently standing in. The group at the front then started to sing, as a choir, a lively song to the others in the hall. Gaara didn’t particularly care for the song, but he did pay attention, to be polite to the singers and to drown out the mindless conversations wafting around the huge room that were even less appealing.  

 

After the song had finished with a loud croak from the toad, the choir dispersed and walked to their seats on one of the four tables, revealing the teaching body, seated at their table behind where the choir had been standing. The conversations resumed soon after and Gaara couldn’t help but overhear a few of them. One that he did overhear was Draco Malfoy mocking Harry Potter across the hall about fainting on the train. Gaara had a feeling that he could make the weasel-like boy faint within a minute of trying, and as he had been told when he was a child ‘you never know until you try’, but that was best saved for another day. 

 

Around ten minutes later, the teachers finished their own conversations with their usual stern looks on their faces, except for Hagrid, the grounds keeper, who looked like he was having the best day of his life.

 

McGonagall walked out of the back entrance to the hall carrying an old small wooden stool and an even older looking witch’s hat. She sat the hat down on the stool just in front of the teachers table and walked to the end of the hall and slipped out of the massive doors.

 

The conversations around the hall continued until she re-entered, this time followed by nearly a hundred scared looking first years, Gaara assumed they were first years because of the their size and skittish behaviour. Once they had been led to the front, Minerva broke off from the group and walked to the table there where she was handed a scroll listing all of the new student’s names. She examined the scroll a little before waiting for something. That something was the hat to start singing. The song was short and riddled with clues for some of the students to be wary, any other hidden meanings were lost on Gaara as he didn’t understand most of the references that the hat made. He was also startled to see a hat singing. 

 

Singing hats…wizards.

 

When the song had ended, McGonagall had taken the scroll out once again and started to read through the list. She called out the first student, sorted obviously by the alphabetical order of their surnames, and the student walked to the rickety old stool and sat down on it whilst putting the sorting hat on their head.

 

The hat seemed to shift as it was on their head before one of the creases seemed to darken and not long after the crease opened again, wide like a mouth, and screamed “Ravenclaw!”

 

Each student standing at the front of the hall was told to move to the front and was then announced as a certain house. They would then move to the corresponding table which would usually cheer or clap, except Slytherin which merely gave a few polite claps and then interrogated the new student about their blood purity, status and other such details.

 

After the last was called and sorted, Dumbledore rose to standing and made a few announcements, like new rules, reminders of old ones like not to enter the ‘forbidden forest’ and the two new staff members: Rubeus Hagrid and Remus Lupin, both of which he’d met before and had seemed friendly enough, though it was a mystery to Gaara why Lupin had abstained from the start of term feast. After a few more announcements along those lines he came to one of his final points, “And finally I would like to add that there will be a new student joining our third years this year” He said as he surveyed the room for the red-haired ‘monster’. “He will be sorted into one of the houses and will be treated as a normal student from this day forward” Dumbledore gestured to Minerva who had since ditched the scroll and shouted in her usual calling tone.

 

“Gaara!” The fact that the new student only had one name sparked a lot of interest in the student body, along with the entire idea of a new third year student, it was unheard of. The rumours spread instantly as the red-head walked to the front of the hall at a leisurely pace until he reached the stool at the front. Along the way many people were surprised by his looks. He had porcelain white skin, blood-red hair, a tattoo in a foreign language on his forehead, a large, thick leather sash across his torso, a metal plate tide around his neck with a black material bandanna and finally his intensely scary eyes, ringed with black, that put anyone else’s glare to shame easily.

 

Immediately the ‘Gaara fan club’ was founded among the girls of Hogwarts.

 

Gaara sat down on the stool like all those before him and placed the worn hat on his head. The hat sat on his head for a few moments in which Gaara wondered if this was all that was supposed to happen when finally the hat said in normal albeit loud speaking tone “I cannot see into this boy’s mind…!”

 

The entirety of the great hall was taken aback by this admission by the hat that had seen into hundreds of wizards every year since the founding of the school many centuries ago.

 

Gaara wasn’t overly surprised to hear this really, as he had spent so many years keeping a demon out of his mind that his mind might have been one of the strongest in the world at repelling intruders, along with the other Jinchurikis.

 

Some of the staff were calling for Snape to use _Legilimency_ on the new student. Gaara didn’t know what ‘Legilimency’ was, but it sounded like some kind of spell, which Gaara wasn’t willing to allow. Dumbledore mused over the idea before disregarding it and standing up, immediately silencing all of the chatter that had started. “Mr.Gaara, would you please allow the sorting hat to examine your mind. It is necessary, for you to be sorted into one of the four great houses of Hogwarts” He spoke loudly enough for everyone to clearly hear but not so loud as to be shouting at Gaara who couldn’t have been sitting more than ten feet in front of him.

 

Gaara closed his eyes and nodded his head clearly signifying his cooperation.

 

“Have no fear, the sorting hat will not reveal any secrets it unearths within a mind it examines” The old man said, quieter than before so only the red-head could hear, as he sat back down on his throne eagerly anticipating the results. Truthfully Dumbledore would have relished the chance to examine the mysterious boy’s mind, more so with this discovery that he was an adept at Occlumency, but if the sorting hat had been unable to penetrate the teen’s mind then he didn’t have much hope of succeeding. Whoever this boy was he was going to find out the old fashioned way, he had let Gaara into the school because he hoped he could protect Harry but from what his dutiful potions teacher had told him, this boy was no pawn. He would have to keep a close eye on him. It was a gamble but if he was as good a judge of character as he thought he was then he wouldn’t have to worry about Gaara, and if he wasn’t then he would have to deal with him. But that was a last resort.

 

Gaara concentrated hard to open his mind enough to allow the probing headgear to access his mind without inadvertently giving Shukaku an invitation to slaughter the countless children and adults around him. Even without sand, the one tailed demon could probably kill most of the fledgling wizards in the vast room.

 

_“So, you’ve allowed me access into your mind”_ Gaara heard the echoing voice in his head.

 

Simply to test out his inner voice he said “ _Hurry, I do not enjoy having others in my mind”_ Gaara was almost happy to hear his own voice, even if it was just in his own head.

_“Patience, first I need to look through your entire mind. See who you truly are”_ The hat said as it probed deeper. Before he could stop its progress, Gaara felt it contact the other occupant. _“Hmm? What’s thi-?”_

The entire of the great hall heard and saw the sorting hat literally scream in what looked like pure agony, unheard of for a hat. The hat, sat on Gaara’s head, continued screaming whilst Professor McGonagall rushed over to remove it. As soon as the sorting hat had been taken off of the blood-red spikes it whispered, almost inaudibly, “Slytherin…” The transfiguration teacher, who had been carrying the hat away from the boy, heard the word and although not surprised she was a little hesitant to declare this sorting. The boy obviously had many ‘demons’, figuratively speaking, in his mind and sending him to the house known for their cruelty and hatred didn’t seem sensible. But she was duty bound to report the tormented hat’s decision despite her opinion and subsequent reluctance.

 

She sat the hat down in the darkened trophy room to rest before she re-emerged, walked to the front and said, in her loudest voice “The sorting hat has chosen Slytherin!”

 

Unlike in all of the previous selections for the snake-house, this one elicited a roaring cheer as Gaara stood up, slightly shakily some might have noticed, and made his way to the clapping table of snobs. He was thanking the gods that he had been able to force Shukaku back into his cage after the intruder had been forcibly removed. He could scarcely imagine what the hat had seen when it had tried to enter the demons mind, but he imagined that it would be quite a few months before it was back to normal.

 

As the sand-tanuki host took his seat on one the benches of the Slytherin table, he heard Dumbledore announce one or two more things to ease the tension that had built in the previous five minutes, which wasn’t overly effective as he announced the dementors presence for the foreseeable future and for the students to take caution due to the escaped mass murderer Sirius Black, before he signalled for everyone to start the feast that appeared when the headmaster had clapped his hands.

 

As Dumbledore had been announcing, he was inwardly cursing himself for not foreseeing this turn of events. The boy was undeniably dangerous if left to his own devices and he had been pushed into the blue-blooded Slytherins domain. The only thing left to see now was the boy’s magical potential. If things did get out of hand he would have to use the elder-wand to eliminate the threat no matter how much he didn’t want to hurt a child, but the prophecy came first if Harry was to save the wizarding and the muggle world from Tom.

 

Gaara had tried to sit down near people of his own age group to spare himself the endless and idiotic questions of the younger years and the matured snobbery of the older years. He hoped he had found a bearable medium. He had judged the ages simply by the weasel-like platinum blonde boy he had met before. It pained him to think he would have to stay in the same dorm as the insufferable boy but he was the only one he knew and that knew that he couldn’t talk. He didn’t want to have to make pulling down his forehead protector to show the scar on his throat his new greeting.

 

“How did you do that to the old hat?” One asked.

 

“What’s your second name?” Came quickly from another.

 

“Did you hex the sorting hat?”

 

“Did you see the look on that old trollops face, when you made the mangy old hat scream?”

 

“Why are you transferring in?”

 

“Who are you?”

 

All of these and countless other questions, most of which weren’t as valid, flooded in as everyone started to eat. Another popular question was regarding his blood purity. Of course, Gaara paid them neither heed nor attention, as he started to eat the delectable food before him. Some of the table seemed to be getting annoyed at being ignored and Gaara was readying himself for a table-silencing glare. Fortunately he was saved the trouble of silencing the table when the boy whom he previously thought to be of no use, Draco Malfoy, spoke up on his behalf.

 

“Shut it!” He had all but shouted, just managing to avoid the teacher’s ears “Stop making such an irritating noise. He can’t speak, you simpletons” After that a few insincere apologies were sent in both their directions the table sat there in relative silence to finish the good food, the only noise on the table coming from the few whispered conversations originating from  the younger years and the braver older years. No one wanted to provoke Draco Malfoy, especially not if he was in league the scary new red-headed serial killer look-alike.

 

The rest of the feast progressed, including a second course and desert, after which Gaara was happy enough to go to bed with a full stomach and enjoy one of the greatest luxuries, sleep. He was also going to be reunited with his precious sand, meaning he wouldn’t feel as helpless as he did without it.

 

One of the older students lead the way down to the lower levels of the school after the feast had ended and Dumbledore had sent them to bed. They arrived at the entrance to the common room where the prefect told them the new password for the year “Noble Salazar”

 

Gaara could foresee the need to verbally speak the password to his temporary home as a potential problem. Then again, he was only at Hogwarts to find a way home and for shelter so a minor inconvenience was acceptable in the long run. 

 

The insides of the underground dormitory were as grand as everything else he remembered about the ancient school. The rich black leather sofas, the eerie collections of human skulls, the big blazing fire set into the black marble fireplace, everything about the place screamed class and dignity, all of which Gaara could live with. It seemed he could get used to living in the Slytherin house for the coming school year.

 

Being as tired as he was, Gaara walked straight back to the bedroom he had stayed in before. When he arrived the door was closed and on the door it read, on the two name plaques, ‘Draco Malfoy’ and ‘Gaara’. Gaara was going to have to tell them his full name at some point, but not right at that point as he wanted to go to bed.

 

Gaara was about to open the door to his room when he heard an unwelcome voice from down the hall. “Oy! Where do you think you’re goin’?” Gaara saw it was one of the henchmen that that Draco boy always kept with him. Not wanting to get into a meaningless fight, Gaara simply pointed at the door, and more specifically at his name on the door. Obviously the boy wasn’t happy with the nonverbal answer as he called over the other lackey and they both advanced on him. When the two tall boys were upon him, Gaara hoped Draco might intervene on their behalf. No sign of him.

 

“What do you think you’re doin’?” The other, slightly shorter slurred, as he tried to intimidate the new student. “Just ‘cus Draco thinks you’re okay, doesn’t mean you get to stay in _our_ room” He continued. It was only after the next sentence that things escalated “-you freak” It wasn’t much of an insult but it was enough. In the last few months Gaara had become a fairly well balanced person, to the point that he wouldn’t kill someone for such a stupid insult, but unfortunately for the two ‘bullies’, this was a special occasion. It was the first full moon Gaara had experienced in this world that night, and, although the main effects were prevented by the clouds covering the moon, Shukaku was still banging on his bars to get free or for blood to be spilt and the memory of his lonely and hated childhood that had been brought to his attention by the all too familiar taunt was only aiding in the one tailed demons desire for carnage. For some unknown reason, the effects of the moon seemed to be so much stronger in this world, though Gaara didn’t stop to think about the potency of the moon and the potential future implications as he was all too soon on a mindless rampage.

 

The red-head jumped into the air between Crabbe & Goyle and spun around to deal a harsh kick to the side of each of their faces causing them to spin around whilst falling to the ground, bleeding from the gashes on the sides of their heads. Gaara wasted no time as he landed in a crouch before diving onto the first boy and started to beat his face repeatedly, using his other hand to bring the podgy face back to where he wanted it so he could continue to bludgeon the boy with his trained fist. When the boy’s sobbing had ceased and he had lost consciousness Gaara jumped to his feet and walked over to the other boy who had started to crawl away with a look of absolute terror on his face. He didn’t get more than ten feet down the lavishly decorated, empty, hallway as he was blown from his hands and knees and onto his side by the foot that connected with his gut. Gaara picked up the single conscious boy by the collar of his shirt and jumper and flung him back to the other. He then leapt over to them and started to kick and punch the other’s face and gut. He continued until both had been knocked out and were bleeding profusely. The look on the boys faces were enough to show what had happened, the look of sheer agony and terror. The agony was self explanatory but the terror, the terror was from Gaara’s face. Throughout the entire brutal attack, the insanely wide smile had never left his face.

 

After he was done, Gaara had slumped against the wall and seemed to wake from a daze which he hadn’t even noticed going into. Though, it wasn’t really a daze as he could remember every detail of what had happened, everything he had done. Gaara pulled himself to his feet and walked back to his door before entering. The place was still empty except for their belongings and his precious gourd. He suddenly felt glad he hadn’t had it on him at the time otherwise he would have undoubtedly killed those two kids.

 

It was only now, as he lay on the bed, that he was able to contemplate his situation. It worried him that he had lost control like that and accepted Shukaku’s anger. But that wasn’t it. He hadn’t just accepted the beast’s anger; he had taken in parts of its chakra and parts of the beast itself. He didn’t know what he could do, when it was the full moon he might revert to his old ways of killing indiscriminately. He had to think of something to do to keep the monster away from others. Somewhere where others wouldn’t go. Somewhere where he could be sure he wouldn’t be found by any students. But he didn’t know the castle that well yet. And he only had a month to find somewhere before the next full moon.

 

Luckily he didn’t seem to be feeling any more of the effects for now. They seemed to come and go, but he had little doubt that when they moon was fully exposed and not hidden by the clouds, he would be a vicious killing machine in the coming months unless he escaped from this world he had been sent to.

 

Gaara got changed and got into the comfortable bed he had slept in just under a week ago and went to sleep.

 

Gaara’s dreams were plagued by demons of his past and, ironically, a demon of his present. He felt glad he when he was awoken by Draco Malfoy walked into the room with a ghostly pale face. He spotted Gaara’s open eyes and as soon as he sat down on the bed opposite to Gaara he started to talk about how someone had attacked some people called ‘Crabbe’ and ‘Goyle’, which Gaara realised were probably the names of the boy’s he had beaten half to death not more than an hour before. After a few more minutes of the one sided conversation Draco too got ready for bed and turned off the magical lights.

 

Gaara was just happy he didn’t have to use his sand to explain why he was in that room. It seemed that the ring leader had a bit more sense than the goons. Or at least enough sense to check the door for his name.

 

As he drifted off again, Gaara couldn’t help but laugh silently at the irony of what Draco had told him regarding the attack earlier. The teachers had declared that the two brutes had had a fight and knocked each other out. Gaara was just hoping that they wouldn’t rumble him when they awoke, otherwise he would have a difficult time explaining what happened without revealing everything. He was already an oddity even in this bizarre school, he didn’t need the extra attention that declaring a demon lived inside him would bring. 

 

Again his dreams were haunted by evils better left unexplained until he woke in the middle of the night. This time there was nothing to cause this awakening other than the horrors of his mind and the sudden blood lust that seemed insatiable at that point. He had woken with the same grin on his face that he had sported earlier that night, except this time the only thing he could direct his fury at was the sleeping teen in the next bed. He reached out one hand to uncork his weapon but as his finger tips grazed the dry material he suddenly came to his senses and withdrew his hand.

 

Once again he tried to go to sleep but wasn’t able to, for fear of killing the sleeping boy in the other bed whilst unconscious. He decided to stay awake all night and play with his sand, it had been a while since he had been able to and he needed a little practice otherwise he might have gotten rusty.

 

Whilst he toyed with the form of the almost liquid sand he started to think about his family and friends back in the elemental nations. He hadn’t given them much thought whilst he was stuck in that foreign world, it was too painful. But now that he did, he wondered what was happening, if they were looking for him, if they were okay.

 

Gaara continued his thoughts long into the night whilst he practiced his control in more ways than one.

 

\-----------------------------

 

The next morning found Sabaku no Gaara still sitting on his bed playing with a small measure of his sand. The only sign of the rising sun came through the submerged windows at the side of the room showing the dark murky water that was beginning to light up into a shade of green that seemed to fit the room precisely.

 

Over the night Gaara had almost gone on a killing spree twice more but had been able to fight off the urge. He had tried to think of places he had seen that could hold him, even without his sand, but all of the doors looked too flimsy and he could easily find his way to people within the school.

 

It wasn’t much longer, after the sun had risen, that Gaara was disturbed from his peaceful thoughts by “How are you doing that?!” Draco exclaimed excitedly, having seemingly woken a few seconds prior and had watched the new redhead manipulating his sand without the use of his wand. Draco pondered on whether this could be the reason the mysterious new boy had been admitted to the school three years into the usual line of education and had been taken to buy supplies with the new defence against the dark arts teacher. He obviously had no relation to the scruffy man, by the looks of them and the way they held themselves. Gaara’s demeanour was not unlike his own, in the sense that both of them held a large air of confidence and superiority and something else he couldn’t quite place yet.

 

Gaara was startled when he was interrupted by the, now awake, blonde boy who had wide eyes like a child looking at an item of extreme interest. Gaara, with a flick of his hand, sent the sand back into the gourd and re-corked it before turning to the intrigued roommate. Slowly he nodded.

 

Draco was baffled. A nod wasn’t what he had had in mind; surely the boy could communicate in some manner. But he didn’t want to press the matter, the last thing he needed was an enemy for a roommate. Also, Gaara was a great deal scarier than his normal company despite his size and handicap so he didn’t want to anger him this early on.

 

Gaara decided now was as good a time as any to get out of bed. For once he was glad that he was practically immune to sleep deprivation as he walked down to the showers and washed off the grime from the day before, along with the blood on his hands that he had picked up before bed, fortunately no one had noticed the red stains. He then re-entered the room to find Draco had also left, presumably to either shower like him or to check up on his henchmen, but he was almost certain it wasn’t the latter; Draco didn’t seem like that kind of person.

 

By the time the towelling-off-Draco returned, Gaara was ready for the day, he just needed to strap his sand to his back and he’d be ready for anything, unless it involved running, because whilst wearing the school uniform he doubted he could run much faster than the average person whilst wearing it.

 

After they were both ready, Draco said he’d take Gaara to the great hall for breakfast, where they would also get their timetables for the following year. True to his word Draco led his roommate to the great hall to eat. Draco, as he walked in front of the mysterious teen, noticed that Gaara had brought his big sand…thing with him.

 

When they arrived, they earned more strange looks than Gaara had the night before as he walked in, carrying his gourd and looking even angrier than before, if that was possible. The visible unintentional and undirected malice had been caused by the mostly sleepless night Gaara had had to endure the previous night. He could survive and function without sleep but his mood rapidly worsened when he went without sleep.

 

They sat in the same seats as the night before, or close, it was a bench so it wasn’t really exact. The biggest difference was this time Draco sat on the other side, with Gaara, as he’d seemingly taken a shine to him, as well as Carbbe & Goyle still being in the infirmary, and the wizarding nobility couldn’t very well sit on his own as far as Draco was concerned.

 

They ate with a relative silence between them, until one Harry Potter entered the great hall. Draco took time out of his eating to call a few insults over to the Gryffindor table regarding the famous teen’s fainting spell on the train the previous day. Gaara tried to ignore the childish behaviour but was soon roped in when Draco had turned back around and started to jabber about how the ‘idiot’ was also a wimp and such. He asked for the newcomer’s opinion and being the kind and meek boy Gaara was…he uncorked his gourd allowing the sand to flow out freely. A ball of sand the size of a football was formed before the cork was replaced. By this point he had most of the people in the great hall staring at him or the ball of sand a few feet above him. Draco was among the many students staring wide eyed at the orb.

 

The sand morphed into words above the red-haired boy with his arms crossed and a prominent scowl set upon his face ‘Did you face the dementors last night?’

 

As the mentioned boy read the message in the air he couldn’t help but blush slightly as the entire great hall seemed to expect his answer. “Well…no, but… never mind” After that he turned back to his food and Gaara did the same, leaving the sand to form into a ball once again and stay in the air above him, floating with a slight rotation to it.

 

Gaara wasn’t really one for humiliating people but he had had a rough night and when he saw someone being such an antagonistic hypocrite he wasn’t in the mood to suffer their idiocy. There was also something else that made Gaara uneasy about the boy he was rooming with, nothing supernatural but something equally disturbing and almost familiar that made him wary, though, he couldn’t put his finger on exactly what it was.

 

Not long after they had finished the spectacle, which had still rendered the hall motionless and silent, which Gaara seemed to have a knack for, McGonagall approached Gaara brandishing a frown almost as deep set as his own. “Mr.Gaara, it is against school rules to use magical artefacts outside of assigned lessons. Being new is not an excuse!” The stern deputy-headmistress scolded in her strong Scottish accent. “Please remove this…” she didn’t quite know how to describe the gourd on Gaara’s back as he sat there with his arms crossed and a decidedly defiant look about him “-artefact” she settled for. “and give it to me now” Her order was all but ignored as Gaara didn’t do anything.

 

Minerva was about to reprimand the boy but he did move. He released one of his arms from their comfortable folded position in front of his chest and pointed his finger upwards in a lazy and uncaring manner. McGonagall looked up carefully, remembering a similar incident with the Weasley twins several years prior with floating water bombs, and not to mention the Marauders mischief, that sent chills down her spine. Above her wasn’t a prank of any kind but instead a message written in sand-letters saying ‘I won’t give you my sand’ the letters reformed after the first part ‘and it is not an artefact’ once again the sand broke into the mist like state before reforming back into discernable letters and words ‘I move this sand with my own power’

 

The senior staff member was shocked by this; to use this high level of control was almost unheard of and to be done by a new student with no training and without the use of a wand. It was terrifying for the Hogwarts professor. The same was true for all of the students of Hogwarts who had seen the messages in the air. McGonagall walked off soon after looking to be in an even worse mood than before. She was going to have to talk to Albus about the boy’s presence in the school after all of her classes were done. Gaara didn’t even get to turn around to quietly finish his breakfast because his head of house, Severus Snape, came walking down the hall with a scowl that seemed to be apparent on all of the teacher’s faces that morning, well, except Hagrid who still looked cheerful.

 

Snape deposited the pile of paper he had been carrying into the lap of one of the seventh years, walking back to his seat not long after. The seventh year didn’t look at all pleased to have been chosen for the prestigious job of handing out the student timetables during, what was supposed to be, his breakfast. Gaara noticed, as he finished off his toast and the juice he had been given, that professor Lupin wasn’t eating with the rest of the staff once again. He assumed the man was preparing for the lessons he would be teaching on his first day of work. ‘Defending against dark arts’ or something akin to that, Gaara checked his new timetable but he wasn’t scheduled for that lesson that day, not until later in the week. The first wizarding lesson he would receive was Divination and it seemed to be with another house, Gryffindor, as were all of his lessons, not specifically Gryffindor but always with at least one other house.

 

Before they left the great hall, Gaara recalled his sand back into his gourd and re-corked it seeing no need to waste chakra keeping it suspended. Fortunately it seemed as if Draco had quickly gotten over his embarrassment at his hands earlier as they both left together. 

 

Once they had left the great hall, Gaara and Draco walked back down to their dormitory, Gaara leaving Draco to speak the password to enter, and into their room to retrieve their books for the first few lessons of the day. By the time they had walked from the bowels of the school to the stone steps leading up to the North Tower, one of them was sweating profusely and gasping for breath, and it wasn’t the one with the gourd of sand on his back.

 

As Gaara was led up the ancient stone spiral staircase to the North Tower for divination, he noticed the constant hostility between both Slytherin and Gryffindor. It seemed childish to him, but so did the hostility between some of the elemental nations. Draco seemed fairly restrained compared to the night before when he had openly and proudly taken any chance he could to snipe at Potter and the other Gryffindors. Gaara guessed it was because of absence of the goons Draco had kept with him before. Gaara had to admit he wasn’t as annoying when the others weren’t around.

 

When Gaara passed through the old doorway into the divination classroom at the top of the stairs, the first thing the tanuki-host noticed upon entering was the overpowering stench of incense and fragrances that made him want to deposit his breakfast over the pillowed floor. He saw that most of the others entering before and after him were suffering a similar reaction to the smell, although maybe not as severely. Gaara literally stumbled to one of the numerous cushions littered around the room with almost no grace as he fell. There didn’t seem to be any chairs in the room so Gaara just tried to concentrate on breathing through his mouth instead of his nose as he hoisted himself into a more comfortable sitting position on the soft royal-purple pillow. Draco sat between him and the rest of the Slytherins so he could get a conversation from the others and cultivate a friendship between Gaara and him, who he decided was worth his time if only for the power the boy possessed, which seemed all the more potent from the display that morning.

 

Gaara was more or less of the same opinion, even as antisocial as he was, he did try, on occasion to create bonds of friendship with people, much to the delight of his doting sister and mocking brother. He decided at that point that he would try and at least attempt to become more…social in this world, if only for the sake of becoming a better person for when he got back home. Unable to continue his current thoughts, Gaara was dragged back to the harsh, smelly, reality that was first period divination.

 

Not long after the poor red-head had sat down, a tweedy little woman who looked jitterier than a blonde-Jinchuriki being followed by a ghost, entered. The curly haired woman walked into the room at a quick pace, only taking time to look at her new students one by one in rapid succession. Gaara was a little disturbed by the way the woman gasped and started to harass one of the overweight Gryffindors about their dead grandmother, or something to that effect. Gaara couldn’t concentrate with all of the perfumes in the air. After she had seemingly read the boy’s, Neville’s, future, she stopped scrutinizing the rest of the students. Instead she went to the front of the circular room and introduced her subject as well as gave a speech on how it was all true and definitely not fake. Gaara wasn’t exactly convinced about that.

 

Trelawney went into the back room whilst the students, who could talk, talked about how much of a crackpot she was; this even extended to the usually quite mild mannered Gryffindors who would normally stick up for such people from what Gaara had seen and heard. Even if Gaara could have, he wouldn’t have joined the conversation though; he wasn’t really one for passive verbal aggression. Every once in a while Malfoy would turn to Gaara for his opinion, usually expecting a positive expression from the boy, only for Gaara to ignore him or to disagree with him. He wasn’t trying to annoy the platinum blonde; he just didn’t want to mislead anyone into thinking that he cared about what the other thought on the subject. 

 

When the woman re-entered she was carrying a tray with around twenty or so tea cups and a pot of boiling water, Gaara lightened up at this. He could really use some tea to clear his nose of the smell that permeated the room, the stench that he just couldn’t get over.

 

All of the students crowded around a few desks leaving two or three to each short table and each person got a cup with tea leaves in and were asked to get out their books and turn to page five: ‘Reading Tea-Leaves’.                                 

 

Sybil Trelawney then went around the room depositing hot water into the cups and asking the students to drink the tea. Some looked almost horrified to have to drink tea, but Gaara just leisurely drank his whilst flipping through his copy of the required text book. Gaara was fairly fortunate that the courses he was taking weren’t too knowledge based as he hadn’t been there in the previous years to study them. The only things he had to worry about was potions which was apparently the only subject that relied on any science, that and that he hadn’t even used his wand yet but he was hoping he would get the hang of it sooner rather than later. 

 

Gaara was finding the tea refreshing, having come from a culture where it was perfectly normal for a boy his age to drink tea. He had quite a taste for the hot beverage, which was more than could be said for most of the other students who had probably only ever drunk fruit juice, water and maybe the occasional hot chocolate. 

 

After everyone had finished their tea they were instructed to read through their textbooks and match the symbols in them to the shapes the tea leaves in the bottom of their cups had taken. Needless to say, Gaara wasn’t impressed. He had been handed Draco’s cup not long after the orders were given and could only see a vague, blobby ambiguous shape in the tea. But Gaara didn’t want to start an unnecessary problem with his teacher on his first lesson on his first day, so he looked through his book again, and picked the most unimportant and unconcerning fortune he could find. It was essentially ‘work hard and the future could be promising’, no actual meaning but would get the teacher off his back. The subject itself was ludicrous in the first place, in the red-head’s opinion, and from what he could hear around the room, many of the others in the class agreed with him. Draco seemingly did the same as he flipped through the book and stopped on a random page and read out the fortune on it. Gaara actually smiled a little at the others antics. He was sure now, that Draco Malfoy wasn’t as annoying without the other idiot Slytherins around him. He’d even managed to go the majority of the lesson without trying to antagonize Harry Potter at all, although he had done none of the assigned work it seemed to be a wide spread practice in this class from the continuous quiet conversations circulating around the tower. 

 

The talking immediately ceased when a clatter resounded throughout the tower, followed by a loud gasp, emanating from Professor Trelawney who was currently standing above Harry Potter’s table and examining one of the tea cups. Gaara was at the other side of the room so he wasn’t too sure whose fortune was being read but his suspicions were proven to be correct when she turned to the-boy-who-lived and started ranting about “the grim!”

 

Along with a few others in the class, who weren’t too shocked by the unfolding scene, Gaara flipped through the text book and came upon the sign of a ‘grim’, the shape of a silhouetted dog that foretold a very unfortunate and suitably titled grim future. The silence that had engulfed the room was almost stifling for the majority of the students, but Gaara, on the other hand, was enjoying the awkward peace that reigned as it was one of the few times since he had arrived in the school that he had been able to collect his thoughts without the noisy distractions around him.

 

After the silence had ended Trelawney spent a few moments trying, in vain, to console the unnerved Potter, though it seemed to all listening like a token gesture towards a dying person, before moving on with a sad look upon her face. She roamed around the room, not really stopping to look at anyone else’s tea cups; this was until she came upon a certain Slytherin pair’s table. She might have looked depressed before and after her previous reading but now her face looked completely devoid of any emotion. She looked to be on autopilot, approaching Gaara and Draco, who were wearily watching the tweedy looking woman as she walked towards them. The entire class had gone silent, all waiting and watching for the next dramatic fortune telling. The only noise that could be heard was the heavy almost unnatural wheezing of the woman who was seeming less like a fake after each prediction.

 

“What?” Draco demanded an explanation for the strange behaviour but he wasn’t even acknowledged as Professor Trelawney continued to focus her seemingly large eyes on the red-headed mute.

 

She paused when she was right before the tiny table and gasped in another heavy breath after which she spoke in a tone very much unlike her usual one _“He, who is part of ten, killer of a hundred killers, will destroy the foundation, and overwhelm death itself!”_ The surprised room of students were as motionless and silent as the dead, as they tried to process the cryptic message of the future from the teacher they had previously dismissed as a fraud. The gaunt looking woman continued in her supernatural tone soon after _“The seven bonded will die, for the final moments will reveal the darkness hidden”_ This time she took a larger breath, the climactic moment approaching _“-unless evil overcomes evil and good prevails… He will return!”_

 

Of all of the students, Gaara was the most shocked. When he came back to his senses, with a double blink of his pale green eyes, he put on his typical stoic expression and watched as others started to come out of the startled state the seemingly genuine reading had left them in.  

 

Not long after the second dramatic reading, the class was over and the students were filing out of the room looking slightly ill, much like Gaara, though, they were just sick of the smell whereas the shinobi was troubled by their teacher’s concurrent predictions….and the smell. In all honesty, Gaara didn’t particularly care about the first of the omens, the aptly named ‘grim’, mostly because he didn’t particularly care about the Potter boy and that particular fortune had seemed to pale in comparison with the second. The second, aimed at him, as far as he could tell, seemed about as genuine as one could hope for a reading of the future. The entire class had been noticeably shaken by the predictions by the time they exited the classroom, though most of them were more startled by the depressing prediction directed at the hero/celebrity Harry Potter. In Gaara’s opinion the boy-who-lived seemed a little too naive and nosy for his own good, but he had decided to bear with the celebrity teenager as he was Sirius’s godson.

 

So far, Harry had tried to stay out of the way of the small, scary looking, mysterious transfer student as much as possible. And the fact that he had been sorted, if that was the correct term for what had happened the night before, into Slytherin, didn’t sit right with him. But, the-boy-who-lived had to admit he didn’t seem overly evil or snobby, unlike most other Slytherins, like Draco Malfoy, perfect example, who seemed to have taken a liking to the mute addition to the year group. Harry just hoped that Draco didn’t turn him into an ass. Then again, the prophecy made in his previous lesson unsettled him as much as it unsettled the rest of the class. Not only had his death been predicted in the tea leaves but also the second prediction of the future that seemed even darker than his own. Harry went with the crowd and gave Gaara a wide birth as he went to his second lesson, with McGonagall. 

 

Gaara was walking on his own down to his second subject of the day, Potions. He had been lucky enough to have the locations of the classes for that day included on his timetable along with the names of the teachers instructing the subjects as well. He was about half way down to the dungeon; fortunately he already knew the location of the damp underbelly of the school, when Draco caught up to him after having walked with a group of his peers with whom he had been chatting. Draco seemed almost calm after the eventful lesson as he started another one-sided conversation with Gaara, being cautious not to mention the surely sore subjects of blood purity or the prophecy that had been spoken not more than ten minutes before. 

 

As they had made their way down to the lower levels, Gaara had been subjected to many not-so-subtle whispers and points along with the good-ol’-stares. They were fascinated, the students, by the new transfer who had used sand, of all things, to communicate that very morning along with his suspect appearance and the strange circumstances surrounding his transfer along with the rumours of the prophecy that were already beginning to circulate; which, combined, made him one of the four most discussed topics in the school, though he was definitely the top topic. Coming in at number two was the elusive escaped murderer Sirius Black, in at number three were the dementors of Azkaban who were patrolling the grounds of Hogwarts, and at number four was the two Slytherins in the hospital wing.

 

Back to Gaara, Draco and the Slytherins, along with half a class of Hufflepuffs in a dank dark potions room, awaiting the arrival of Professor Severus Snape, potions master of Hogwarts and detestable excuse for a human being in most of the students opinions.

 

He had swept into the room with a scowl set deeply upon his face, which seemed to deepen more so when he spotted the crimson-haired monster teen whom he had already taken a drastic disliking to.

 

“Well, well. If it isn’t the silent wonder” He mocked as he rounded on the desk Gaara was sat at. The teenage shinobi wasn’t too bothered by the mockery of the staff member as his mood was already starting to lift. The fact that there were stools in this classroom instead of chairs meant he could continue to wear his trusty gourd on his back where it belonged. “Should we expect any other miracles today, or can we get on with the lesson?” He asked, and by the length of the pause following his inquiry, Gaara assumed that he was expected to answer, which was another insult all by itself due to his obvious inability to do so.

 

Gaara settled for glaring at the man while waiting patiently. Snape smirked as he strutted to the front of the room thinking to himself that he’d won the encounter. Even a few of the Slytherins had had the gall to snicker at the bullying and had thrown nasty and snide looks towards Gaara who, after Severus had finished making his way to his desk at the front, had turned his own attention to removing the heavy gourd on his back after he had been told by the only adult in the room that every student was to walk to the front of the cluttered and dank room and collect the ingredients he was writing on the board, thus necessitating the removal of the bulky object for the time being.

 

The red-head noticed with a smirk that after he had walked to the cabinet at the front of the room, people who were walking past his desk were avoiding his sand like it was going to jump up and bite them. He could have made it do that, but the teacher already seemed to have a great measure of loathing for him for whatever reason and using the already-frowned-upon-sand to injure one of the students seemed foolhardy despite however much enjoyment he might have taken from doing so. 

 

After he had picked up the items listed on the blackboard, which he couldn’t recognize from name alone so he simply selected the same things as everyone else, he made his way back through the students who, from the looks on their faces, seemed only slightly afraid to be near him, and back to his seat where he deposited his armload of potions equipment and ingredients. Draco appeared soon after with his own equipment.   

 

The tanuki-host watched as Snape started to write the baffling instructions onto the board leaving most of the class looking almost as befuddled as him. So, in an effort to avoid failing he attempted to copy what his classmate was doing.

 

Attempted being the operative word.

 

Draco Malfoy wasn’t particularly gifted in potions, despite what his grades and teacher’s compliments might lead one to believe. But no matter how un-talented Draco may have been at brewing potions, Sabaku no Gaara was ten times worse, at least. It was probably the same reason he was also unable to cook even the most basic of recipes. Gaara had no brewing or cooking ability which probably could have explained why he never killed his sister over the years. She may have been insufferable but she kept him fed.

 

It didn’t escape Professor Snape’s attention that Gaara was messing-up his potion, obviously having no talent nor previous experience in the subject, and so he decided to do the kind thing… and ridicule the poor boy much like Mr Longbottom from Gryffindor.

 

He swept over to Gaara and Draco’s desk to find that whilst the potion was meant to be a thick bubbling pink substance, was, in the red-haired boy’s case, a gooey green colour that occasionally released a noxious gas that made him gag. The only consolation about such a revolting potion being created was that his detested student, creator of said potion, seemed to be having a worse time with the smell than he thought strictly necessary, then again, he had worked with some of the worst smelling substances known to wizard so he might have lost some sensitivity in his nose.

 

He looked to his favoured student’s cauldron to find a murky purple liquid in the cauldron that seemed to be around the same consistency as one of the perfected potions like his own or, he dreaded to say, Granger’s.  

 

Severus settled for mocking the child he hated, on par with his loathing for Potter, by making subtle verbal jabs “You incompetent… did you mix some of your oh-so precious sand in or are you just so inept that following a simple potions recipe to the letter is beyond what your strange little mind can follow?”

 

…About as subtle as a drunken punch from Konoha’s green beast. 

    

“Well, why don’t you answer? Oh right, you can’t. I don’t understand why a little freak like you was admitted into this great school” Snape continued his tirade, long since forgetting the reason he had started. He had silenced the entire class, which for the third time that day had had to stop what they were doing and focus their attention on the angry looking red-head who seemed to be getting more and more furious from the looks of his scowl and invisible eyebrows arching and shadowing his murderous eyes.

 

Gaara was so very close to performing a desert burial on this greasy haired man but was stopped when his attention was drawn to a small explosion that covered half of the room in the green substance he had concocted. The red-head was one of the few lucky enough to be spared from being covered by the nasty looking liquid. Though, luck might have entailed that he didn’t allow his sand to spring up and protect him and the platinum blonde sitting behind the sand at the time. It might have been more accurate to say that Draco was lucky.

 

Snape, who couldn’t fathom how the harmless ingredients he had listed on his, now green, blackboard, had created such a repulsive mess. Also listed among his regrets for that day, along with letting the mysterious student into his classroom, was his slow reaction, because his slow reaction was the reason why he was now covered in his student’s potion and was practically screaming for everyone in the room to leave. He would have liked to do more, to cause a little misery but if he deducted house points it would be his house to suffer, which wasn’t entirely ethical to spare his house’s points where he would otherwise have decimated any other’s chances of winning the house cup at the year’s end, and if he gave Gaara a detention he would have to let that monster into his classroom again.

 

He was going to talk to Dumbledore that night and have that child removed and possibly imprisoned for the crime of being a nuisance and a monster, among other things. 

 

Gaara and Draco, two of the few that weren’t covered in the former’s creation walked out of the potions room with smiles on each of their faces. The smile progressed as they walked until, as they reached the great hall, they were actually laughing with each other. Gaara’s was a silent laugh but his face was enough to make Draco double his own roaring laughter.

 

They gained quite a lot attention as they entered the hall but it didn’t faze the taller boy, quite as much as it did Gaara. The shorter had had quite an eventful day, even for him, and didn’t relish the prospect of having to sit through another hour in which he would be stared at, questioned and in all likelihood, scorned. With this in mind he turned to Draco who was still sporting a grin and pointed in the opposite direction the great hall and when the platinum blonde inevitably questioned him he waved and walked away.

 

As he left he couldn’t help but smile a little more as he relived the past lesson. He hadn’t laughed like that in quite some time. Too long, in fact.

 

He walked straight out of the front entrance to the school and continued walking until he couldn’t hear any voices. He then sat down, under the closest tree and tried to gather his thoughts. The day wasn’t even half-way finished and he had already pretty much destroyed one potions laboratory, had an unsettling and ambiguous prophecy made to him and made a name for himself throughout the entire school. And he still had one lesson to go.

 

Caring for magical creatures didn’t sound too difficult. They couldn’t be that dangerous compared to some of the things he had met in the desert over the years.

 

‘At least I don’t need to use my wand yet’ Gaara thought to himself as he removed his gourd from his back and set it beside the tree so he could lean back. ‘I need to get some practice with this’ Was his next thought as he pulled out the black stick and started to examine it. He knew he couldn’t do it whenever he wanted because the use of magic was strictly monitored and he didn’t want anymore hassle. He seemed to be getting enough of that on his own. He would need to wait for the night to try using it.

 

Gaara looked up at the sky and couldn’t help but think of his own bright blue sky, remembering fondly a few months prior when he had actually been berated by Temari for staying out, under the burning sun, for a few days straight. She had had the best intentions when she lectured the predictably bemused looking Jinchuriki about wearing a hat or at least taking shelter every few hours. He had then had to convince her not to try and make him were one of Kankuro’s spare hoods. She couldn’t have made him but it would have been troublesome problem had he not promised her that he’d take care of himself.

 

Now that he was thinking of home, he started to think of his main mission whilst at Hogwarts. He hadn’t really had a chance to look for a way home yet, but he had plenty of time for that. He didn’t really expect the task to be simple as he had to search for an answer without any help whatsoever. He didn’t want to tell anyone that he was from another world because, like telling them he had a demon sealed within him or that he used to be a serial killer, it would just cause problems for him and draw unnecessary attention. He might be kidnapped or arrested for being a monster or an alien or something like that so he decided he would rather just try and solve his problems on his own first.

 

Gaara was forced from his musing when he felt a presence that was unmistakable in its infinite evil, an aura that he hadn’t felt since he was back in Suna. Worse than a hundred dementors, this feeling that was crawling up is spine could only have been one thing.

 

Fangirls.

 

The young red-head had had to deal with a fan-club before, the Sunagakure chapter. They, along with various assassins, had been the bane of his existence for the last few months, ever since he stopped killing people. And even then, he had heard rumours it had started before that.

 

The short teen looked around and saw what he dreaded; a group of around twenty girls were slowly making their way towards him. As he looked at them he could have sworn he heard the native mating call of the fangirl ‘Squeeee!!!’ It was at this point he decided to make his exit and leave, quickly. When he stood up, with a slight look of fear, yes fear, on his face they started to walk towards him faster and more excitedly. The tanuki-teen brought his hands together, eliciting more ‘Squee’s and questions from his fan club, and moved fingers into the tiger seal in front of his chest. Suddenly, he disappeared along with his gourd in a flurry of sand.

 

Gaara reappeared just inside of the main entrance where he could hear the loud screaming and squeeing that was more than likely to have caused at least a few cases of deafness in birds around the school.

 

Deciding that he wasn’t willing to deal with any more fangirls he walked back to his room in the belly of the school to pick up his text book for his final lesson of the day, seeing as lunch was almost over.

 

He walked back through the school, deciding along the way that if he ever became Kazekage by some bizarre and unlikely miracle, he wouldn’t change the castle at all. All of this walking would be exhausting for civilians.

 

He made his way outside, where it said his class was, on his timetable, to the edge of the so-called Forbidden Forrest, which he recalled being warned not to enter the night before by the headmaster. When he reached the area, he found rest of the class arriving, all holding their text books with the utmost care and each carried expressions of dread on their faces. Ever since Gaara had received the ‘Monster Book of Monster’ from the fearful and surprisingly injured sales assistant, he had been careful not to open it, as it didn’t seem to like being touched if the growling and snarling were any indication.

 

When the majority of the class were present, excluding the stragglers, everyone seemed to be talking, always talking. Gaara had always enjoyed the tense silences that could be found in the perpetually sandy village he called home. One notable conversation was between Draco Malfoy and Harry Potter, each with their own lackeys for backup, though Draco had had to find temporary replacements apparently. Though, a discussion wouldn’t have been the correct term, it was more along the lines of mockery, one-sided of course…

 

Once again Draco seemed to be mocking the trio of Gryffindors and like the previous night it was regarding Harry’s fainting spell on the train as a reaction to the dementors harrowing effects. They, Draco and a few unknown Slytherins distracted Potter long enough to pull up the hoods of their robes and perform a satirical “Oooohhhh” looking marginally like the creatures they were mocking.

 

After the near-fight, Hagrid had appeared with a great thumping as his colossal feet hit the ground. He instructed them to stroke the spine of their books to soothe their frightful temperaments. Gaara did so, but not before he uncorked his gourd so he’d be ready for a sudden, and biting related, attack. Fortunately it seemed he had a way with this world’s animals, including the hardback and paperback variety. By the time he’d reached the page Professor Hagrid had called out the book was literally purring in his hands.

 

The page he was reading, silently, like all of his activities, was about a species of magical creature called the hippogriff. Gaara had wondered why the gigantic new professor hadn’t been allocated a classroom and was beginning to suspect it was because of his kind and meek nature when the giant man starting to march forward with the rest of the class trailing behind him whilst trying to open their monstrous books without being attack viciously, though for the poor minority it was in vain.

 

By the time the entire combined class of Slytherins and Gryffindors had arrived at a clearing within the surprisingly well lit forbidden forest the gourd baring red-head was sure it was going to be a practical lesson, he surmised by the looks of the large hippogriffs standing in the centre of the clearing. They each looked to easily be the size of a horse and had the head of an eagle along with talons bigger than most kunai. They were moving towards Hagrid who had stood at the front of the class, in between them and the animals, and was explaining that they were proud and dangerous. That rung a bell with Gaara but he couldn’t place the familiar description.

 

Rubeus continued his explanation, showing quite a bit more ability than the shinobi would have credited him with from the brief encounters the had had as well as the giant’s appearance but he seemed as proficient at teaching as Snape, but without the irritating personality and damp classroom. The time came for a demonstration as he called for volunteers from the students, to approach one of the deadly looking creatures. Gaara, along with the twenty or more students around him took a large step back, leaving one student standing at the front of the class.

 

Gaara unnoticeably smirked as he looked upon the startled face of Harry Potter who was moved forwards by Hagrid’s massive hands. Harry was forcibly moved towards the closest Hippogriff, called Buckbeak if Gaara had heard correctly. As instructed Harry walked forwards further and bowed lowly to the half bird, half horse creature which wasn’t immediately returned, causing the teacher to start to panic and start to approach the student and animal hoping to avoid an incident on his first day of teaching. Fortunately he was going to avoid losing his job as the bird head started to lower until the beak was practically touching the ground, causing almost the entire class, minus most of the Slytherins, to breathe a great sigh of relief.

 

Before anything else could have possibly happened, Hagrid lumbered over to the, still shocked, teen and picked him up causing the black-haired Potter to start to object, especially when he was sat atop the large bird-horse. As he voiced the last of his objections the professor slapped the hippogriffs behind like one would do to its horse counter-parts and like a horse it started to gallop away from the group, its wings starting to flap.

 

Soon after, the hippogriff with the supposed saviour atop of it flew into the sky and out of sight. Gaara looked back towards his teacher and wasn’t surprised to see a big smile on his face.

 

Around five minutes after the screaming boy-who-lived had disappeared he returned, landing almost in the exact same spot he had taken off from. Hagrid walked over and helped him down before pulling what appeared to be a dead weasel or pheasant off of his coat and threw it to the animal a few feet from him. The bird head chomped on it happily before walking away a little ways, back to its herd.

 

Hagrid had leaned down towards Harry and his friends before standing back up straight with a very pleased look on his face. Gaara hadn’t heard what he had said due to him still standing with the Slytherins who looked decidedly less impressed than their rivals at the flight of one of the students. Their disapproval of the apparent achievement grew to such an extent that Draco couldn’t hold it to himself any longer. He started to insult the hippogriff, Buckbeak, whilst approaching it. He called it an overgrown turkey and ridiculed it in many other ways, none of which were advisable if the shouting and terrified face of their magical-creature-expert teacher was a sign.

 

Gaara was running forwards before the talons of the enraged hippogriff left the ground and by the time they were about to strike Malfoy, who had raised his fore-arm in a terrified attempt at self defence, Gaara had already uncorked his gourd again and was letting the sand flow out of it and in front of the terrified aristocrat’s son. The san formed a rough shield to block the razor sharp claws from doing any damage to Draco. After the unsuccessful strike, Buckbeak landed back on its feet before walking away looking as angry as Gaara had ever seen a bird get.

 

Hagrid looked more than just relieved to see that no one was hurt, so much so that he didn’t stop to question the shield of sand that had since dissolved and been drawn back into the gourd from where it had originally sprung. Unfortunately the sand had not gone so unnoticed by the rest of the class who seemed determined to ask him all kinds of questions that he had no doubt they had wanted to ask since the morning. As they, the entire class, walked towards him, Gaara backed away quickly and walked towards the hippogriffs and Hagrid who had since gone to check on them and thank whoever was listening for not having to explain to an angry Lucius Malfoy that his son was almost maimed.

 

Rubeus noticed the scary silent student approach him and his herd of hippogriffs and by way of an apology and to show his gratitude for saving his rear, he turned to Gaara and asked “Wanna ride one o’ these beauties?”

 

Gaara shook his head, not wanting to leave his gourd on the ground where it would most likely be toyed with and possibly broken by the ignorant and, for some, jealous students.

 

Unfortunately for the sand Jinchuriki, Rubeus Hagrid smiled and undid the strap running across his chest for him before hastily picking him up and depositing him on one of the hippogriffs; despite his silent, frantic, protests.

 

The hippogriff didn’t seem to be too happy with the pairing either, much like the red-head who was still being held onto the bird-horse hybrid. Gaara couldn’t help but notice that the giant hadn’t let him go through the bowing ritual that Harry had had to before, Hagrid was obviously too excited with not being in trouble to follow his own procedures.

 

Before either, magical creature or perturbed demon container could voice, or, in the latter’s case mime, any of their protests and profanities at being forced to ride/carry the other, Hagrid slapped the giant horse’s ass sending it into a veritable charge ending much the same as the previous one, in the sky.

 

Gaara had to close his mouth as he flew through the sky, being utterly shocked to have been thrust into the air on the strange foreign creature. He gripped strongly onto the feathers on the back of the eagle-like head as the owner of the head swooped through the air. Just as he was starting to enjoy the feeling of flying through the air, like the wind that his country was famous for, he jerked suddenly as the bird dropped down to just above the tree line causing him to accidentally tear out a few of the feathers he had been holding.

 

Sufficed to say, that didn’t end well for the short crimson haired sand sibling.

 

In mid-air, the startled and angered hippogriff started to swoop faster and more excitedly, like a bull trying to forcibly eject an irritating cowboy. Gaara almost desperately tried to get a tighter grip on the feathers on the back of the squawking beast’s neck; but even that effort couldn’t prevent him from being thrown straight over the bird head and falling twenty feet through the air before hitting the top of one of the countless trees that made up the deepest area of the forbidden forest. He hit the top of the tree wishing he had his sand on his back, as the coming fall would have hurt a lot less. As he brushed past the highest branches he tried to stick his feet to the tree trunk but he was falling too fast, which was made painfully clear as he started to impact on the lower, thicker, branches of the pine.

 

Gaara, being the wise ninja he was, had learned from his mistakes and had remembered to activate his armour of sand before being forced onto the giant bird-horse, which was probably the only reason he was conscious after hitting the hard cold ground. Though he was conscious, he wished he wasn’t as the armour had taken the brunt of the potentially fatal fall but left him with a dislocated arm and possibly a broken leg as well as what he imagined would be plenty of bruises. The worst part was that he didn’t have enough sand with him to carry him, nor did he have enough time to sit around and try to make more. Gaara pushed himself, using the nearest tree, to his feet and started to limp through the dangerous forest. He wasn’t worried, walking through the woods which were renowned in this world for being incredibly perilous, as, even with the limited sand he had coating his body, he could still defend himself.

 

He continued limping through the dense growth of roots that comprised the forest floor until he could hear the faintest shouts of the giant who had put him on the beast in the first place. At that point it had been nearly two hours since his take-off but Hagrid and some of the students had stayed behind after the classes for the day had ended to look for the absentee new student.

 

Gaara started to walk towards the voices that couldn’t have been more than a mile or two away when he heard a low rumbling, almost like an earthquake but more localized. It was off towards the mountains but whatever it was; Gaara decided it sounded distinctly angry. Deciding not to dwell on nor investigate the rumbling noise whilst he had so little sand, he moved on. It didn’t take too much longer to get back to the opening in the forbidden forest where he had left over two and a half hours before, despite what he was beginning to suspect was a twisted ankle as well as the broken leg and dislocated arm. Ninja’s had to continue no matter how injured they were, and he had heard tales of ninja’s who had marched onwards after losing limbs. The only reason he was struggling so much with the injuries was because he had only started getting injured during missions in the last year-or-so. Ever since the Chunin exam he had been sent on more dangerous missions resulting in the damages to his body. But it was still rare that he was hurt this badly meaning that by the time he was spotted by his teacher he was about ready to collapse.

 

Hagrid had been so worried for his student that by the time he spotted a patch of blood red past the trees, over two hours after he had disappeared, he hadn’t stopped to think that not only were the kind Gryffindors helping him look but also the usually cold and distant Slytherins, who were known to be almost as callous to their own as they were to everyone else. For them to have been searching meant either a very good sign or a foreboding one.

 

The giant bounded towards the limping, stumbling, Gaara, followed soon after by the student search party, comprised of most of the Gryffindors, Draco Malfoy and all of the Slytherins that the latter could blackmail. The red-head was less than happy to see Hagrid as he firmly placed blame for his most recent suffering, but he didn’t have the luxury of standing still long enough to kill or maim the man as he needed to get to his sand before he passed out. If he was going to be unconscious in this school he needed to close to his sand. He couldn’t leave himself defenceless, because he knew, after the eventful day he had had, he wasn’t safe.

 

When the group neared Gaara they all, including the stoic purebloods, simultaneously gasped when they saw the deep dark cracks that webbed across the glaring teen’s face as well as his hands and presumably everywhere else on his body.

 

“Gaara, what happened? What happened to your face?” Hermione pried, a perfectly normal action for her.

 

“I knew it!” Exclaimed Ron at the mute teen’s silence, misconstruing the lack of immediate explanation for the cracked face and disappearance as a sign of guilt. “He’s an impostor, look at his face!” He pointed in righteous indignation “And remember on the train and the way he uses that sand he’s always carrying around! And he doesn’t speak to anyone!” He had blurted out the entire accusation at an ear splitting volume pushing the accused into further pain and displeasure.

 

“He’s mute Ronald, he showed us the scar when we met him in the Leaky Cauldron” Gaara almost face palmed as Granger explained his continued silence.

 

Throughout the entire encounter Gaara hadn’t stopped stumbling forwards to where he had been forced onto the hippogriff despite the wall of students seemingly trying to block his advances, obviously attempting to get him to lay down or explain before he hurt himself more.

 

“But look at his face ‘Mione!” The orange-haired teen bellowed once more, the last time such an outcry was sounded as he received a swat to the back of his head for his troubles from the aforementioned girl.

 

“I’m sure he has a very reasonable explanation for that” Hermione said, almost patronisingly to her friend “He might have a skin condition or maybe-” She was cut off when Gaara held up his hand and, despite his reluctance to do so, removed some of the sand covering his face to show that he looked the same underneath it. He collected the sand, as it dissolved off of his face, in his hand before commanded it to recover the pale skin once again. He had been fortunate not to earn any bruises on his face as they were sure to be purple and encompassing over his small body.

 

“He’s made of sand” One of the other students gasped making Gaara question the teaching of the previous years of the school as the student didn’t seem to be quite as bright as the average person, even Konoha’s Green Beast hadn’t accused of him being ‘made of sand’ and he wasn’t exactly a genius.

 

Fixing another glare at that student, Gaara noticed the pile of sand in the forest floor, the gourd having obviously been broken whilst he was gone. He recalled the sand to him, reforming into his gourd in mid-air before being strapped back onto his leather brace. A look of fear passed over most of the students, soon turning into a look of absolute terror as he led some of the sand drift up to form shapes. They seemed to think he was going to attack them, and whilst it was tempting it wasn’t what he did…anymore.

 

‘It’s armour’ The sand spelt out again. Oh how he loathed his inability to speak. Thankfully for him, it was only an inconvenience and not crippling.

 

The message caused a look of realisation to wash over the previously startled teens before it vanished again when one of his fellow Slytherins asked him about his disappearance.

 

Gaara was amazed some of these people were able to dress themselves in the morning with such simple minds, then again, they probably used magic for that.

 

He used the sand to morph into new words, simple enough to conserve chakra and his precious time, time which was quickly running out before he would pass out ‘I fell’ All of the students expressions, minus some of the more composed Slytherins and the ever optimistic teacher shifted into more embarrassed and surprised.

 

It was at this point that Gaara decided that he was safe enough so he slipped out of consciousness to the sounds of startled shouts and the feeling of being picked up. His last act was to command the sand to protect him.


	3. A New Scar

"Headmaster, I want that abomination thrown out of the school at once!"

"I'm afraid I will have to agree with Severus on this; it doesn't seem safe for him to be around the students when we know so little about the boy."

"Severus, please, we cannot remove the boy whilst he is still unconscious. And from what Hagrid has been telling me, Gaara saved young Mr Malfoy's life earlier today."

"But Albus, that weapon on his back-"

"I will talk to Mr Gaara about his origins, and see if I can't get him to leave his…" At this, Dumbledore paused "-personal belongings in his room during classes from now on."

"Why can't we leave Gaara alone?" Hagrid boomed, "'E really saved Draco Malfoy today… though 'e also ruffled up Snaggleclaw's feathers, but 'e seemed nice enough." Hagrid stated, having taken a shine to the terrifying teen who he had carried to the infirmary several hours prior to the staff meeting, that was held annually on the evening of the first day back, usually for discussing all of the initial problems around the school and so on, though, this year, seemed to be greatly focussed on the mystery student who was fast becoming even more famous that their resident saviour-in-glasses.

"But what of this prophecy that all of the students have been nattering on about since this morning?" Snape questioned, fully believing it to be a fake prediction, though, still an irritant and an issue to be removed as soon as possible.

"I will need absolute secrecy from here-on-out," Albus said with all of the usual mirth disappearing from his voice, "as what I am about to tell you must not reach outside ears. From what Sybil has been telling me, this morning's prophecy made about Mister Gaara was real," This garnered mutters around the room, all stating that almost all of her 'sights into the future' were false despite her heavy defence of their credibility. Dumbledore waited for quiet to reign once more before he continued "and I believe she is telling the truth. It wouldn't be the first time she has made an accurate prediction." Dumbledore looked over his half-moon spectacles towards Minerva, Severus and Remus, giving them a knowing look to convey the hidden meaning, regarding the last true prophecy she had made about Harry Potter all those years ago.

Gasps circulated the room at the revelation, leading many to turn towards the shaky little woman in the corner, who looked about as surprised as the rest of the staff, although hers and the three other staff members in the know, were shocked by the apparent similarity to the prophecy that led to the Potter's death and subsequently Harry Potter's destiny.

Lupin, who had remained silent until this point to hide his secret/illegal connection to Gaara, had heard about the foresight when he arrived back that morning after his monthly late night run, and was more shocked than anyone to say the least. Like most, he could only speculate about the exact meaning, as he knew little more than most about the red-head other than his foreign background and his past as a ninja, which was strange enough. "Sir, do you have any idea what it might have meant?" He broke the tense silence, needing to know who his best living friend had aligned himself with.

"I fear the only person who can decipher the meaning behind Sybil's prediction is the boy himself." Albus replied before turning towards Mrs Pomfrey and following up his statement, "How is Gaara, Poppy?"

Like Trelawney, who was still slumped in the corner whimpering ever so slightly, Poppy Pomfrey was also sitting away from the others, looking nervous and uncertain. She glanced up when she heard her name, seemingly coming out of a trance before taking a moment longer to process the question she was faced with. "The boy…He's still unconscious but he had a dislocated arm, broken right leg and sprained left ankle as well as heavy bruising all over his body from what I could see."

"So he should be fine by now, am I correct?" Albus said with a smile making him look like the perfect grandfatherly figure.

"Well… that's where there was a problem. My spells worked in diagnosing the boy fine but when it came time to heal him, they were blocked."

"Blocked?" Flitwick asked.

"Well… they didn't seem to affect him at all. Even my most powerful spells didn't heal the boy." She said looking as perturbed as a witch whose magic had been proven ineffectual should. "At first I assumed it was because he was covered in coating of sand, which I was able to chip off somewhat, but even after that I still couldn't heal him."

Dumbledore looked thoughtful for a few moments, the influx of information was a lot for his old mind, before he turned back to his trusted medical witch, "Poppy, please return to the infirmary and inform me when he wakes up, as I think there are a few questions that need to be answered." Albus said.

"Headmaster, why didn't you investigate this boy before you admitted him to the school?"

"I was distracted; I ran out of lemon drops and I was planning to visit Hogsmeade to pick up some more that day." Dumbledore said, making every last teacher either smile good naturedly or face palm and storm off. Of course, it had been a complete lie on Dumbledore's part, as he never ran out of lemon drops. He didn't want everyone there to know his real reasons for allowing the increasingly mysterious mute teen into Hogwarts. "I think if there isn't any other pressing business to attend to, we should all retire and enjoy an early night's sleep." Albus ushered the remaining teachers and Hogwarts staff out of his office before returning to his desk and writing a letter to the Ministry of Magic. He needed more information about this boy and despite his dislike for the Ministry; he couldn't leave things to chance any longer, though, that wasn't to say that he was going to tell them the whole truth either.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Professors Snape and Lupin both left the meeting feeling anxious from the startling information garnered from the previous discussion about their enigmatic charge and, that, in the entirety of the two and a half hour assembly, they hadn't talked about anything other than Gaara.

Snape pointedly ignored Remus as they descended the staircase, the former hoping not to have to speak to his old school-yard 'chum'. He reached the hallway at the bottom of the narrow winding stairway and briskly walked onwards, trying, in earnest, to lose Lupin, lest he start up another irritating conversation that would be sure to make his blood boil, intentionally or not.

He looked up ahead at the oncoming passages whereupon he would travel to the left whilst his peer would be forced to walk in the opposite direction if said peer wanted to make it back to his office before midnight. He was counting down the steps until he was safe from further aggravation but as luck would have it, just as he thought he was free from annoyance, he heard: "By the way Severus," Lupin said walking just as fast as the potions master at this point, "-I don't suppose you've noticed how closely Gaara resembles Lily Potter, have you?" Remus finished the rhetorical question innocently before veering off in the direction of his office with the sadistic satisfaction that only came when he toyed with 'Snivelus'. He was never one to antagonize anyone, and he had never fully supported the bullying of Severus when they were all at school together, but he couldn't resist mentioning the one thing he knew would drive Snape insane. It was an impulse more than a vendetta, but he still couldn't help himself, despite how guilty he would feel in the morning. As Lupin continued walking down the hall, silently chuckling to himself, he mused that he still had a month until he needed the senior potion expert's help again. Besides, it was not as if it wasn't true; Gaara did look a lot like his deceased friend's wife, startlingly so.

Snape, on the other hand, wasn't in such high spirits about the verbal jab, having felt every taunt laced within it. Especially the addition of 'Potter' instead of Evans, which made him spend an extra hour that night roaming the halls to torture punish wayward students. He managed to find three wanderers but even that didn't satisfy him. By the time he made it back to his personal chambers that night, he was still angry enough to revise his lesson plans for the next week to include a pop quiz for every class.

There would be blood.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

It was late. Most people can usually gauge this simple fact for themselves after a long and tiring day of classes, ending with an eventful Care of Magical Creatures, including a greatly injured student and an angry hippogriff. However, the fact that Ronald Weasley kept bringing the irksome subject of the time and his minor sleep deprivation to the attention of his two closest friends was not helping anyone.

They had been up for the past few hours after lights-out for a few reasons: first, was the topic of Harry's prophecy and the possibly related big scary black dog he met towards the end of his stay with the Dursleys; second, was the ongoing mystery of Gaara, which seemed to be on everyone's minds for one reason or another. The final reason they were up was because they had a nagging suspicion regarding both Crabbe & Goyle; Malfoy's loyal lackeys, had been hospitalized the night before and had yet to wake up from the brutal assault that had been carried out. Most had dismissed this event as two oafish boys fighting for some trivial reason or another, and so it was ignored. The so-called 'Golden Trio' were not so unquestioning. They had the crazy notion that the strange and violent looking new student was involved somehow, though it was only a suspicion.

On top of the attack, Gaara was still just an enigma, which, according to Hermione, was better off solved for everyone's sake. They resolved to go and sneak into the infirmary and try to discover something, anything about the unconscious anomaly. There was just one problem to deal with…

"Just get under the cloak Ron." Harry said for the third time, trying to persuade the reluctant friend to join Hermione and him in their 'justified' quest to snoop into another person's personal life, to sate their curiosity.

"Aren't we being a bit, you know…nosy?" The ginger third-year questioned looking doubtful and afraid.

"No." Hermione answered simply, looking as self righteous as she often did in these situations, before ducking back under the invisibility cloak.

Soon enough the older male gave into the selfish logic, too tired to argue any further, and joined the other two under the fabric as they made their way out of the Gryffindor common room and down the hallway towards the sick bay. On the way they had a close call with an irate looking Professor Snape, who seemed to be on the war path earlier this year, but managed to steer clear.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

"I've always hated it in here." Gaara grumbled to himself as he walked through the tempestuous desert plane, using his own influence over the flying debris to deflect the endless sandstorm that had plagued his mindscape since his first trip there all those years ago. He could scarcely see five feet in front of his nose, which, he had to admit, did seem a little worse than usual. He had realised, not too long after his first few visits there that the intensity of the storm depended upon his emotional state. Right now he was still angry at his troubling situation and the earlier events that day that had led to his impromptu lesson in skydiving and, subsequent, spur of the moment nap.

Despite the low visibility in the messy mind, Gaara knew exactly where he was walking, and where he was heading. Just as he expected, he reached the red rock of the cave that led him underground, deeper into his mind. Eventually he reached an enormous cavern, lit by hundreds of eerie hovering spheres of fire that seemed to float around the cave freely, illuminating the solid sand pillars, as wide as Gaara was tall, that bisected the gigantic space from floor to ceiling. Behind the bars of the cage, stood the fittingly large one-tailed demon, Shukaku. The monster was on his back two legs, as per usual, and had the same sadistic smile he often wore when speaking with his host. The Jinchuriki couldn't help but reminisce about all of the years he had been convinced that his prisoner was actually the woman who gave both gave birth to him, the same woman who gave him his cursed name.

"Hello mother." Gaara sarcastically greeted his tenant through the large scowl on his face, with as much sincerity as he was likely to receive in return.

"Hello sonny-boy! It's been too long since you visited!" Shukaku roared with laughter, the deep and menacing chuckles rumbled along the cave's floor causing Gaara to shiver imperceptibly in disgust at his vulgar sealed-demon. "Have you made any new friends? You haven't killed anyone interesting in months." Shukaku continued, looking down at his container with little more than contempt and patronising amusement.

"I need you to answer my question." The red-head glared back at his captive, before turning his head and taking note of the cracks in the sand pillars that kept the tanuki in the secluded cave. The ichibi was bound with both the original seal from before Gaara was born, the one that led to his mother's death; and the newer barrier that he himself had created after fighting _him_. The original procedure that forcibly injected the demon of the sand into him, took the form of shackles that affixed said demon to the furthest wall of the cave. The bars that restrained the beast further and shielded the rest of Gaara's mind from its malicious influence were an addition that he had been building since he got the head-butt of a lifetime. It was what allowed him to spend his nights asleep instead of killing people, which, he had to admit, was a great deal more peaceful.

"What happened on the full moon?" Demanded Gaara, asking his most pressing question first, mindful of his tenant's rapidly changing moods. He needed to know what had happened that could have damaged his mental blocks so extensively. He couldn't risk letting them dissolve, they were the only things that allowed the red-haired teen to live without the fear of losing his mind further.

"Well well well, and here I thought my good little host would be tellin' me." The great monster chortled with what seemed like genuine amusement at his captor's ignorance. "Never mind, it'll be even more fun next month when I finally get to take a peek outside."

"I have another question." Gaara stated after a moment, in which he pondered on the cause of the lunar disturbances, since even his supposedly old and wise demon didn't seem to know. Then again, with Shukaku, you could never tell if he was telling the truth or not. "Why hasn't my voice returned yet? Your chakra should have healed it within a few weeks."

"Why should I heal you? You're so borin' these days; you don't even kill people anymore…" The titanic creature rumbled, acting more childish and spiteful than a demon of his calibre ought to.

This struck Gaara, he had assumed the reason to be something like because of the extensive and serious nature of the wound it would take longer to heal, or the same reason for the strange issue of the full moon was also the cause; but for it to be something so immature as a bored Biju almost led to Gaara's first sweat drop and face palm, but even in front of this revelation he was able to maintain most of his composure. However, Gaara's glare worsened, causing Shukaku to openly laugh in his face.

If Gaara was honest with himself, he would have had to admit that he wasn't entirely affected by his mutism, as, even when he could speak, he didn't speak that often anyway. So it wasn't such a drastic change to his life that he could really get mad, but the reason for his demon's stubbornness was well within the bounds of reasonable fury in the red-head's opinion.

Letting out a small sigh at the hopelessness of certain creatures, Gaara continued the strained conversation, which seemed to turn into a decidedly one-sided question and answer session, and it wasn't on his side.

"No way is my host so weak that he couldn't even take a little fall like that!" Shukaku cried after Gaara explained why he was in his mindscape in the middle of the day. Gaara usually waited until it was night time to check up on the demon or ask a question, so it came as a delightful surprise when his little Jinchuriki told him he fell over a hundred feet and got beat up enough to lose consciousness and break a bone or two. Soon after the delight faded it was replaced by disbelief for the humungous entity at the prospect that a shinobi on the level that Gaara was at was so badly wounded.

"I was trying to stop myself from falling, I didn't have time to prepare for the impact as well." Gaara said, almost looking embarrassed that he was rumbled by the monstrous creature inside of him. "If I had had my sand with me I would have been fine." It might have seemed like Gaara was trying to justify himself to his dreaded demon but he was really trying to make sense of his own mistake.

"I wish they'd stuck me with someone worth inhabiting, like that idiot from the leaf with Kyubi. At least that orange bastard got that kid, N-"

"Shut up demon!" Gaara cut in, not willing to listen to the ridiculous monster rant at him any longer.

"Touchy." Shukaku sulked at being scolded by the boy who was about one hundredth of his size. "It's not my fault you're so stupid you didn't think of making more sand to get back to that boring castle."

That shocked Gaara; he didn't know Shukaku could think an intelligent argument. Of course, Gaara had thought of making more sand using his armour so he could carry himself back instead of making his wounds worse, but that wasn't really an option considering the ground surrounding the castle he currently resided in was made out of minerals that were incredibly hard to turn into sand and were also very wet. It had taken him around ten or twelve hours last time he tried to make enough sand, and he had needed at least some medical attention before then. It was an incorrect argument, but an intelligent one nonetheless.

Gaara didn't bother to explain the problem with creating sand to the demon as he suspected that the ichibi knew the problem before he asked, he was just trying to start an argument.

Oh, how Gaara loathed demons.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Harry, Ron and Hermione came to stand just outside of the massive wooden doors that led to the infirmary where the target of their amateur enquiries was resting as far as they knew. After their close call with Snape, they had decided to take the long route to the infirmary, which was less likely to have anymore teachers patrolling. When they finally arrived, Ron was stumbling every other step, his eyes drooping as his body begged him to let it sleep. Hermione, contrarily, was almost bursting with curiosity, wanting to discover the mystery of the new student, which she had convinced herself, would be as easy as walking through the big wooden doors she was waiting in front of, though this may have been partially due to the tired state she would not admit she was in. Lastly, Harry was incredibly anxious about everything that was happening around him. The serial killer after his life; the dementor's effects and presence at his supposed safe haven; the new scary teen, whose prophecy actually seemed to outshine his; all of these new elements in Harry's life were so stressful but now he had a chance to remedy one of those problems with a little investigating.

"Are you sure we have to do this?" Ron practically pleaded with his two closest friends through half lidded eyes.

"For the last time Ronald, we have to know if this 'Gaara' person is dangerous." Hermione said, exasperated in the quietest manner possible. "Of all people, _we_ should know. What if he's working with Sirius Black, or worse, you-know-who?" As per usual, the second mentioned individual was spoken with as much care as was usually taken when referring to the murderer.

"But couldn't it wait 'til tomorrow, you know, when we've all had some sleep and breakfast…" Ron ended his argument with a pointed yawn. He was completely ignored as Hermione and Harry discussed what they would ask Gaara when they saw him.

"I'm leaving now." Gaara stated after having to listen to the infuriating tenant within him mock him about every facet of his being. It was not a new occurrence for the vulgar monster to make light of him, but the reformed red head wasn't in the mood to spend the next few days inside of his mind listening to the single largest burden of his life tell him how he was the littlest shinobi in the world.

"Aww! No fair, take me with you!" Roared the demon of the sand as he started to attack the pillars of sand that separated him from the rest of Gaara's mind. As per usual, the bars of the cage, when damaged, quickly regenerated. This was why the cracks from the full moon were so troubling, considering they had had hours to heal and yet there they were. Fortunately Shukaku wasn't having any luck in breaking through the bars, though it wouldn't grant him freedom even then as he was still shackled to the wall of the cave.

Gaara walked out of the cave, all the while listening to his 'guest' rage on. The sandstorm was just as fierce as when he last saw it, if not worse, because of the aggravation he had just suffered through.

Once the architect of the inner world had reached the right area in the completely indistinguishable landscape, he closed his black-rimmed eyes and concentrated.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Once he opened his eyes again, Gaara saw he was laying in a soft bed, with immaculate pressed sheets, the gourd dutifully sitting next to his bedside. The metal framed hospital bed was surrounded by the standard blue privacy curtain, which Gaara was thankful for as he heard that his face, half covered in sand was quite the terrifying sight. That was according to various villagers and his brother, who had had been slightly more elaborate in his colourful description of his little brother's face.

Reaching his hand towards his gourd, he was irritated to find his arm in a sling. He was glad to find that despite his obviously grievous injuries, he was without any serious pain. He assumed that whoever had brought him to the medical bay had used some kind of painkiller or spell to alleviate the worst of the discomfort.

Gaara surmised from the candle being the only source of light in the otherwise dark infirmary that he had slept through the evening and into the night. He tested his arm to see how badly damaged it was, but was relieved to see it was already beginning to heal. Though, his broken leg was another matter, as he knew it was take at least a week to heal a broken bone.

The bed-bound boy wanted to see who else was in the hospital area but was reminded that unless he wanted to don a green spandex jumpsuit and orange leg warmers, he wouldn't be walking anywhere with a broken leg.

When he had finished checking over his body for any other ailments, he was reminded that his face was still half covered with his armour of sand like a horror movie reject, so he reached out his other hand and had the sand trickle out of the gourd and onto his face. When his face had become the pale porcelain mask it was supposed to be, he sat back in the surprisingly comfortable bed and tried to go back to sleep, seeing nothing else to do until morning when he would undoubtedly be inundated with questions from the teachers about what happened.

The tanuki host sighed lightly when he realized that after the several-hour nap he had just indulged in, he wasn't going to be sleeping anymore that night. He sat back up, trying to locate where the doctor or nurse might have stored his clothes, disliking the hospital gown he had been changed into during his slumber, but to no avail it seemed as the bedside table didn't have anything inside of it other than a half eaten box of jelly beans that looked months old, and an old sock. Since Gaara didn't want either of the two items he looked around his secluded area, but the only other thing within sight was his trusty gourd which, true to its orders, hadn't left his side even when he was asleep.

As long as he wasn't going to get any sleep, Gaara reasoned, he might as well have a look around. Even if he couldn't stand up, he wasn't called Sabaku no Gaara for nothing.

The small hand, not held in a sling, reached out to the over sized container of sand and formed a one handed seal, causing the cork to pop off and more sand to fly out, pooling at the foot of the bed until about half of the gourd's sand had been expelled. Gaara closed his hand causing the sand on the floor to follow suit and compact into a more stable platform, about three feet in diameter.

It was quite awkward for the racoon impostor to manoeuvre himself off of the bed and onto his now floating pad of sand, but he managed to land on the deceptively soft bed of sand in a kneeling position. He was thanking whatever latecomer god of luck that seemed to be on his side that his leg wasn't in a full length cast, as it was have made moving all the more difficult.

Gaara, comfortable on his floating mound of sand, used his power and rose upwards so he could look over the curtains and survey exactly what sort of facility he was staying in.

He hadn't quite expected to see what he saw. As what he saw, was none other than the two boys he had beaten half to death the night before sat in a pair of beds on the other side of the medical bay, which, from his observations, seemed to be as lacking in technology as the rest of the school. But the primitive technology, or lack of, didn't hold the shinobi's attention for long in light of his recent discovery.

The Jinchuriki couldn't help but feel a small measure of guilt when it occurred to him that he had actually forgotten about the two thugs he had hospitalized on the full moon. He had been so wrapped up in the fear of Shukaku's influence and the hundreds of other problems he was having that day that he hadn't actually thought of the two teenage non-combatants he had nearly killed. More to the point, he hadn't thought of a way to keep them quiet. He wasn't nearly skilled enough at Genjutsu to erase their memories, nor was he optimistic enough to hope that they had lost all of their memories of the night before.

Gaara ducked down behind the curtain to think for a few moments, before he had an epiphany. He had been presented with a golden opportunity to kill two birds with one stone, though not in the more literal sense which would surely disappoint his blood thirsty demon. Gaara flew up again, so that his head was visible to the two idiots in the messy beds who were now playing cards that seemed to explode for some reason beyond Gaara's understanding and interest, after which, he waited patiently until the idiot with the slightly rounder head glanced in his direction before doing a terrified double-take, prompting the boy sitting with his back to Gaara to turn around and do the exact same action.

Gaara did his fiercest glare at the two goons, before he rose upwards slightly so that he could lift his arm, the arm not in the sling, into the view of the two boys. He knew that he had their complete attention when he thrust his arm towards them with his index finger extended, causing both to flinch almost comically. He then drew his pointer back to his mouth, holding it there for a few second in a silent shushing gesture before he removed it again and started to slowly shake his head, never taking his eyes off of them. His last gesture to them was that of sliding his thumb across his throat like he had with the headmaster.

To Crabbe and Goyle, the meaning of the silent message was loud and clear: 'Don't tell anyone, or I will kill you!'

Satisfied that his job was done and he had satiated his curiosity, he lowered himself to the level of the warm and cosy hospital bed and rolled himself back onto it with skilful ease, without hurting his leg, arm or battered torso once.

He was quite happy with himself; he didn't feel guilty for hurting the two buffoons, who were now huddled under their covers filled with fear the likes of which most never have to endure, and now he knew why. The two large boys had started an unprovoked attack on someone smaller than them with no prior knowledge that he was trained in fighting from birth, meaning that they were bullies and Gaara didn't like bullies.

The first figurative bird the stone had killed was the secrecy he had just instilled in his classmates, which he was sure would be enduring considering the level of fear present on their faces when he had descended back into his secluded area of the hospital wing. The second metaphorical bird was probably more important than the first, being that he wanted to save someone from the mistakes he had made in his past. Draco Malfoy was a lot like himself, Gaara had thought, seeing as he was callous and often cruel because he was expected to be. Whilst Gaara had a demon and a village of people expecting him to kill and then hating him for it, Draco had the snobs that surrounded him in Slytherin, the two thugs that he had just struck with fear and probably a family that instilled this hatred of others in him. Gaara had learnt from a certain someone that the only way to end the suffering and become truly strong was to remove the hatred and find people you wish to protect. He couldn't stand to see his roommate and first connection with someone of his own age in this world fall into the spiral of hatred, so he removed one of the influences that drove the misguided aristocrat to act so coldly.

As Gaara settled back, readying himself for a few hours of meditation, though, not the inner mind exploration kind of meditation, but rather the clearing of one's mind; he felt a presence enter the room. It felt like three people, but their chakra signatures seemed to be distorted. The ninja of the sand had been happy to discover that the people of this world gave off chakra signatures like his own world, though they were much weaker in this world, meaning he was able to sense people in a similar fashion. The downside was that, as the volumes of power were so much smaller than his own world, he could only sense them when he was meditating and it had a very limited range. Still, it had its uses. Detecting sneaky little wizards was one of them.

Gaara continued to concentrate intently on the presence that was moving through the room slowly and carefully, obviously looking for something or someone. The sensation of chakra moved past his secluded area, and towards Crabbe and Goyle, who, by the sounds of things, were shivering in fright and hidden under their bed sheets. The intruders walked to the end of the infirmary, by the obese shaking teens, before it seemed to return to standing just outside of the curtain.

Opening his eyes, Gaara spread the sand from the platform he had been using before, on the floor around his bed, ready for any malevolent trespassers if the need arose to defend himself.

The injured shinobi waited patiently, but the longer he waited the more anxious he became. Before long, Gaara had convinced himself that the people outside of the curtains were most certainly ninjas, there to attack him, so much so that he was already channelling chakra into the sand on the floor so that he might be able to attack a little bit quicker.

What had seemed like hours of waiting to the antsy red-head was actually no more than a minute or so, before the curtain that encircled the bed was quietly drawn, only enough for a peak at first before it opened wider, revealing a lack of anything to the boy on the bed. The boy was astonished, as he looked on at the void where someone should be. Concentrating, he could still feel the people there, but couldn't see them.

If Gaara was tense before seeing nothing, as oxymoronic as it sounded even to himself, he was at an entirely new level of anxiety. He was injured and there was an intruder with enough ability to become invisible, which was an S-rank jutsu. It did occur to the seasoned ninja, that it might have been some kind of spell, and that instead of a highly skilled, S-rank shinobi suppressing their chakra, bearing an evil intent, it could have been a few wizards trying to find out about the strange/scary new kid. This thought was quickly dismissed in place of the tried and tested pessimism that had kept him alive all those years.

As if peering out of a crack in space itself, a teenage face peaked into existence in front of Gaara's bed. Gaara mentally berated himself for being so naive, as the immature face of Harry Potter looked at him in mild surprise before it disappeared again. It was more shocking to the trained assassin that he had been so wrong, than the fact that the irritating boy, and presumably his two friends, had snuck into the medical bay in the middle of the night looking for him.

After a few second Gaara grew tired of waiting for the hiding young wizards to reappear so he formed a tentacle out of sand and wrapped it around where he felt them standing, causing a small squeak to be emitted as the sand vine wrapped around the intruders tightly enough for them to still instantly, not able to fight back. Sighing, Gaara relented and released the students, letting them fall to the floor revealing that they had been using some kind of sheet to hide.

The injured foreigner waited as the startled teens attempted to regain their collective breaths, before they all turned to look at him in absolute anger and fear, a common sight for the demon container.

"What the bloody hell was that for?" Demanded Ron in one of his trademark fits of ignorant rage. "You could have killed us!" He supported this exaggerated accusation by holding his throat as if his still couldn't breathe.

Gaara stared evenly at them, holding his face as impassive as he could, despite the hypocrisy of the ginger child as he declared, after intruding on an injured peer, that Gaara was rude. Granted, the youngest male Weasley didn't use such tame language but the sentiment was still sent and received.

Harry and Hermione waited along with Ron for an answer before the only girl in the room realised, long after she should have, that the person they were questioning couldn't talk, much less answer their imminent questions. As the three boys stared each other down, Gaara managing to easily outdo both of the Gryffindors, Hermione smacked the two by her sides in the back of the heads, ending the childish match immediately. The two, having been unexpectedly hit turned and gaped incredulously at their friend in utter shock and bewilderment at the unsolicited attack. Soon enough, after they had regained their senses, though it didn't take quite as long for some as others, they both burst into a fit of angry questions similar to the ones that Ronald had asked only moments ago towards the now forgotten blood-red-head.

"We can't ask Gaara any questions," Hermione started looking a little embarrassed at her own violent outburst, "he can't talk."

Harry and Ron looked at the flustered girl, before looking each other in slight humility and reproach before turning back to Hermione with puzzled looks on their faces. "Weren't you the one who said we should come here and ask Gaara questions?" Harry asked, regaining some of his humour in light of his friend's oversight, Ron agreeing quietly next to him.

"Well…that's not important right now. The important thing is that we're here and he's okay." The accused quickly recovered, after this, she turned to Gaara and apologized quietly for all three of them.

The apology garnered the first, albeit miniscule, response from the only person who was meant to be there, in the form of a small nod. This seemed to spur the intrigued trio on, as if they had forgotten the transgressions of the last few minutes.

"Use your sand to answer again." Harry suggested/commanded, after reviewing the problems they had had the last time they asked Gaara to answer their questions. "We need answers." He said with all of the conviction he could muster, though to the seasoned and sceptical Suna-nin, it seemed more like petulance.

Gaara shook his head, deciding he didn't want to give these people, whom he didn't know nor particularly like from the brief encounters he had had to endure in their company, any easy answers.

As the looks of outrage and incredulity dawned upon the inquisitive triplet's faces, Gaara turned his head to the side and closed his black rimmed eyes. Needless to say, the lions didn't fall for the suspicious person's feigning sleep, nor did they give up on their quest.

"Who are you? Are you working for Voldemort?" Harry cried, losing patience with the 'sleeping' Gaara who did not stir.

"We just want to know what happened." Hermione reasoned to the silent and still Gaara, "How did you get hurt?"

"Say something, or use your sand, you bloody freak!" Ron started forwards, to grab Gaara and shake him until he was sure he was awake. The freckled teen did not account for the sand he had demanded be used, but he could not be blamed as, although adrenaline had kept him conscious, he was still incredibly tired. Due to his sleepless state, Ron didn't see the shield of sand enclose the bed that Gaara was lying on, which gave him enough of a fright to back away so quickly he tripped over Harry's misplaced foot and almost went flying out of the enclosed area. He was saved, barely, by Hermione who grabbed the back of his robes at the correct moment, and pulled him back to his feet where he looked at the dome of sand in fear and shock, which was more or less mirrored by the boy-who-lived.

"What the ruddy hell is that!" Ron exclaimed.

"What is he?" Harry concurred with his loud friend, in an almost equally exuberant manner.

"…He's an injured student with permission to be here…"

"That's not what I meant Herm…" Harry started to reply to his brainy friend's sarcastic reply when he felt a tense hand bear down heavily upon his shoulder. Nervously, Harry glanced away from the giant sand ball in time to see an irate Madam Pomfrey grab Ron by his shoulder in the same menacing fashion. Harry didn't dare move, for fear of incurring any further wrath from the infamous nurse-witch. When Ron had come to the same damning conclusion of imminent punishment, he poked Hermione, prompting her to turn around, which was soon regretted by bushy haired girl after she saw what she was turning around to see.

"What are you doing disturbing my patients, Mr Potter, Mr Weasley and Ms Granger!" The fuming woman yelled as she pulled the two boys out of the secluded area they had been harassing Gaara in, Hermione following sullenly after. "I will be informing your head of house, of this indiscretion." Poppy Pomfrey ground out through clenched teeth. She came to the doors of the hospital wing and roughly pushed the two teens out, causing them to fall onto their faces. Hermione followed her friends soon after, though, with somewhat more grace as she managed to stay on her feet.

She helped Harry and Ron to their feet, before looking back at the irritated, for good reason, medical witch who threw one more threat their way: "You'll be lucky if don't tell the headmaster about this!" The tired witch slammed the door in their faces, as quietly as possible it seemed.

"Well, that was a waste of time." Ron commented offhand as he started back to their dorm. "Let's hurry before we're caught by another teacher." The ginger boy said, yawning shortly after and not realising that the witch who had terrified each and every one of them wasn't actually a teacher.

"What now?" Harry asked, almost rhetorically; as their plans had been dashed by their discovery, and Gaara had been most uncooperative.

It didn't occur to any of the golden trio at any point that Gaara's bad mood could have been cause by them as they ducked back under the invisibility cloak and walked back to bed.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOhe

Madam Pomfrey, having been woken during her much needed and relished sleep, decided to check on the three patients she had acquired one day into the term's beginning. She first went to the most serious case in her care, the one which she had rescued from the onslaught of questions earlier. She didn't know how useful any inspection of Gaara would really be, considering, last time she checked, he was encase in a ball of sand. This didn't really worry her as she was aware of his abilities, the ones he had showcased before, and so it was probably a defensive measure, and seeing as she couldn't do anything to heal him immediately, he was probably better off safe from others.

She drew back the curtain slightly, expecting to see the pale brown grains of sand that had formed the ball in her infirmary, however, she was surprised to see just the boy laying there, with the most peaceful, that is to say, the least scornful look on his face that she had seen or thought possible. His eyes were closed and she presumed he was sleeping, but the position he was in, sitting up as if addressing company, couldn't have been comfortable. Being the caring soul she was, she moved closer to him, mindful of the sand that apparently protected him even in sleep, and gently slid her hand under his back and slowly moved him down into the warm sheets, receiving no protests whatsoever. When the small boy was situated comfortably under the crisp white sheets, Poppy moved on, silently marvelling at how such a scary and uncompromising boy could be so innocent and small at times.

The rest of the medical expert's night was spent sending the already healed Slytherins on the other side of the medical wing back to their dorm rooms, when she found them to be awake and eager to leave. Afterwards she left to go back to sleep, in hopes of being able to competently examine Gaara in the morning and see if she could remedy his preventative immunity to magic, or at least, healing magic.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Eyes seemingly ringed with charcoal opened abruptly to find the sun filtering through the paned windows, to the beholder's annoyance. Gaara sat up in the comfortable bed, taking note that nothing was missing nor out of place from last night. He could hear footsteps on the cold hard floor making their way past his area and onwards towards the office at the back of the room.

Already, the Jinchuriki could feel the effects of his accelerated healing; making his previously dislocated arm nothing more than sore and his leg was probably well on the way to being fixed. The majority of his bruises had also faded, meaning that, whilst he would not be running any marathons, the red-head would be semi-mobile, with assistance.

By the time he had finished checking himself over, Gaara had forgiven the sun for being so bright and was moving onto another irritant: his hunger. He had skipped several meals and, when he had healing several injuries as well as his other exertions to fuel, it did tax him somewhat. Gaara would have left for the great hall for breakfast, not willing to let a broken leg and sore arm stop him from feeding himself, but he was still wearing nothing more than a hospital gown. The hungry demon host resigned himself to waiting until he could get his clothes back, or at least, his school uniform back.

About half an hour after Gaara's stomach had rumbled for the first time, the reformed murderer heard the same footfalls moving around outside, and the quiet clinking of thin glass not long after. The curtain was drawn back ever so quietly, presumably so as not to disturb his sleep, despite his wakened state. There stood the nurse, judging by the nurse's uniform, recognizable even to one from another world, who looked like a deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming murderous, immortal, religious zealot.

"Oh! You're awake." She stated, sounding more pleased than fearful, which was a pleasant change from all of the other times he had been visited whilst sick or injured. "Thank goodness. I suppose you're hungry, hmm?" She walked around his bedside and slowly took his wrist in her hand; she tested his pulse before walking back around the bed and checked his other arm, which was still in its sling. Gaara had once been told that he never moved when he was asleep, which wasn't that much of a surprise; what had shocked him was that the person who had watched him sleep all night had the gall to call him creepy.

Gaara nodded to the question, despite it probably being rhetorical and waited, always with the waiting, as she walked back out through the curtain and came back minutes later carrying a tray with some food on it. It was set in front of Gaara, on the table that went across his lap, to which he bowed his head in silent gratitude to the food he so desperately wanted. With no further ado, the patient started to eat his food in such a reserved manner that the witch, currently drawing the curtains from around his bed, would have no clue to the enthusiasm with which he was savouring the food he slowly fed into his mouth.

As the ninja continued to eat at his leisurely pace, Madam Pomfrey, with not other pressing matters to attend to, sat down in a chair she conjured out of thin air, and waited for the boy to finish the meal he was clearly enjoying despite his neutral face. Gaara honestly found it a little unnerving the way she sat there with a serene smile on her face as he did nothing more than eat his food with the basic manners he had been given as a child. He was not used to being cared for when ill, as he had been ill only once before. He had caught the flu and was bedridden for a week, in which Temari had tried to take care of him in a caring and lovingly big-sister kind of way but he had forcibly removed her out of exasperation and suffered all through that week safe in the knowledge that she would have never let him forget a moment of weakness like that. Temari was a caring and often overbearing older sister, but she was still an older sister.

The refined shinobi finished the last bite of his meal and pushed the table away from him, the wheels on the bottom of the table aiding him.

"That's better now, isn't it?" Pomfrey smiled as she pointed her wand at the tray and muttered something making it disappear with not so much as a pop. "Now, do you feel up to answering a few questions or do you want to wait until later?" She asked looking slightly more serious, almost grave in the face of interrogating one of her patients.

Gaara nodded, knowing that he could just ignore her if he didn't want to answer one of her questions. He was also grateful for her medical help and the relished food, so he watched as she cleared her throat and began.

"I tried to heal you last night when Professor Hagrid brought you in, I'm sure you guessed as much. But my spells were all blocked. None of my healing spells helped you at all. I need to know, do you have a curse on you of some kind?" Poppy finished with genuine concern, having come to that most logical conclusion the night before during the hours when she couldn't sleep no matter how hard she tried.

The mute teen hesitated for a moment, considering what to do, before he nodded his head. He agreed to the concept of a curse because admitting a demon was in him was less favourable in his experience. The whole problem with the healing spells wasn't a mystery to the intelligent teen, as he knew of at least one spiteful and just plain mean entity that would go to such lengths to just annoy him. Shukaku was still healing him at an accelerated rate, but was obviously blocking the spells from doing anything further. Oh how he despised that monster!

Pomfrey looked concerned and thoughtful for a brief moment before looking up again with an obviously forced smile, to hide her growing worries about the boy in front of her. "Also, Gaara, what happened yesterday? How did you get so hurt?" This had been the second most pressing question she had wanted to ask, the rest were mere curiosity and could wait until the others arrived.

Gaara, in turn, looked thoughtful also before turning to his gourd and waiting for the cork to pop off and sand to flow out. Instead of assuming the shapes of words above their heads like the matron had expected, the sand flew in front of Gaara and started to mould into the shape of a hippogriff, which she had been told about when the gigantic man had brought him in. The mini sand-hippogriff floated between the two occupants of the infirmary before a sand stick figure, smaller than the model magical monster, climbed onto its back. Madam Pomfrey watched on in fascination as the miniature winged creature took flight and dropped the model-Gaara from a great height.

After a few more routine checks, the nurse left Gaara on his own with promises of returning soon and that he should stay in bed.

The patient wasn't too happy about being ordered around by a civilian, but by the look on her face when she commanded him to stay put, there would be worse hell to pay if crossed her than being insubordinate to the Godaime Hokage.

So he took in his new found view of the room he was in whilst he was alone. It didn't escape his notice that some time between when he threatened them and now, the two goons had left the hospital wing. 'Good riddance' Gaara thought.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

"Good Morning Poppy." Albus welcomed his resident healer into his office with a smile as he finished reading the letter he had received only minutes earlier. The guest knew to wait until Dumbledore had finished whatever he was doing before disturbing him. He was an important man and any mail he got this early in the morning was bound to be fittingly urgent, or so she reasoned. She was shocked, however, when the elderly man had finished the parchment with a serious look on his face before burning the letter and turning to her.

"What can I do for you this morning, Poppy?" The headmaster asked gaining his usual mirth by the end of his sentence to the relief of the stressed healer.

"Sir, Gaara woke up about an hour ago. You asked me to notify you."

"Ah yes, I'd almost forgot about Mister Gaara." Dumbledore lied flawlessly, having thought of little else that night. In fact, the letter that he had received was from the Ministry, to notify him that no one of Gaara's description or name had ever been recorded on any documentation in the magical or in the muggle sector, ever. He had had the response owled to him overnight using his considerable influence at the Ministry of Magic. They had checked and he wasn't even under the surveillance that all underage magical children were automatically added to. This was incredibly troubling for the great wizard as it meant that he had an unknown piece on his chess board and he didn't know whether the was black or white under his coating of sand. Albus realised he had paused in his thoughts so he followed up his previous statement with an enquiry, "How is he doing today, Poppy?"

"Well, he is much better and from what I could tell he seems to be healing incredibly quickly." The nurse-witch looked happy at this revelation, having discovered that many of the injuries from the night before had lessened or in some cases disappeared. She couldn't explain how it was happening other than to dismiss it as another one of the curiosities that seemed to surround her newest patient. "I talked to him briefly and he told me he fell off of a hippogriff, mid-flight. Also, he told me he couldn't be healed because he was cursed."

"Did he mention what curse?" Dumbledore was raptly paying attention hoping to solve the puzzle that was Gaara.

"I'm afraid we didn't really talk, seeing as he's mute. But he did nod when I asked if it was a curse."

"Thank you Poppy." Albus smiled, silently processing the information for later. "Anything else?"

"No, nothing, sir."

"Very well, I will accompany you to the infirmary so I can have a talk with Gaara as well." Waving his wand, the various scrolls on the ancient wooden desk started to pile themselves up or hide themselves in drawers and chests around the room as Dumbledore rose to his feet and walked behind his trusted medic to the hospital so that he might finally get some satisfactory answers.

"Oh, and Albus," Poppy said as she walked through the corridor, "I found Mister Potter and his two friends harassing Gaara in the middle of the night. Probably woke the poor boy up."

Dumbledore chuckled good naturedly at the predictable antics of the golden trio. "Not to worry Poppy, I'm sure Mister Potter and his friends were just as curious as the rest of us who their new classmate is."

Madam Pomfrey couldn't help but notice that, despite Albus' words, he was walking incredibly quickly towards her station of work. The nurse had a difficult time keeping up with her boss as he strode in haste, turning each corner as fast as he could. There was no real rush to get to Gaara, as far as Dumbledore knew, he just had things on his mind that were driving him to worry.

Dumbledore reached the infirmary doors a full sixty seconds before his trusted medical witch, though he decided not to announce his winning the silent foot race as it seemed a little childish, so he settled for eating another Sherbet Lemon as his prize.

Huffing, Poppy arrived to see Albus eat another sweet, before she moved past him in minor annoyance at his obvious childish antics and into her infirmary. Dumbledore followed silently, sucking on his sweet treat in bliss. The old man was less than surprised to find Gaara in bed after he had been told of the seriousness of the injuries the young boy had sustained the night before; however; he would have been lying if he had claimed to have expected the short teen to be awake so soon.

"Good morning Gaara." The bearded white-haired man said merrily as he approached the silently teen who regarded him with subtle caution. The red-head returned the greeting with a nod; pretty much all he was capable of at that point considering his muted voice and unwillingness to exercise his sand abilities for such a trivial response. "I'm glad to see you're up, you had us all worried."

Gaara nodded again; a silent thanks that was just as insincere as the concern in the professor's aged voice.

"I have to get some potions from Severus. I trust you won't tire him out too much." Poppy said softly before leaving with a nod from Albus who waved her off with a smile.

"Gaara, I was hoping that we could reprise our little chat from the other day." The elderly man said as he sat down on the closest chair.

The bed-bound boy sighed silently as he readied himself for one of his least favourite games: 'Question Evasion', the game for grumpy shinobi. Not suitable for children under the age of four. Batteries sold separately. Nonetheless, Gaara slowly nodded his head in resignation to the fact. It could have been worse; Gaara remembered his absolute least favourite game from when he was a child: 'Pin the Kunai on the Jinchuriki'.

"There have been some concerns raised regarding you, Mr. Gaara. More specifically, your past. I realise now that I may have been hasty in my admittance of you into the school considering I know next to nothing of your past." Truth be told, Albus didn't like lying, in fact, he hated lying outright but when it came to protecting the school and the magical world, he didn't have a choice.

Gaara activated his sand and let it form its natural ball shape in the air, ready to answer any question posed, though how they were answered was still up to him.

"Well, I suppose my first question should be: what is your surname? You never mentioned it before." Dumbledore said, listing off all of the things he wanted to know before the end of the morning.

The sand formed the words 'Sabaku no Gaara' without delay. Dumbledore made note of the unusual prefix of 'no' before the second name.

"So Gaara is your surname, and Sabaku is your first?"

*Shakes head*

"Oh, I see. You say your name backwards." Albus stated, almost surprised considering the boy was speaking perfectly fluent and unaccented English yet he had a foreign name and wrote it the other way around, surname after first.

Gaara wasn't too happy about being called backwards but ignored the distasteful comment in favour of concentrating on keeping his face empty and the ball floating, now that the words had dissolved.

"So, I think my next question would be: where are you from?"

Gaara paused for an instant, thinking of a suitable half truth to tell the intrusive person in front of him. When he had decided on the correct omissions the words appeared in the air a sentence at a time. 'I am from a desert village.'

That didn't answer his question.

"What country are you from?"

'We call it Wind Country.'

"What would foreigners call your country?"

'I don't know.'

This was tiring, as far as the questioner was considered, but that did not deter him. "How did you get here?"

'Professor Snape brought me here from Hogsmeade.'

"How did you get to Hogsmeade? There aren't any deserts near here," Dumbledore thought twice about his last statement when he recalled all of the secret places within the wizarding world, "are there?"

'I was transported here.'

"From where?"

'My home country.'

Albus, a man renowned around the wizarding world for his patience and will power was losing this battle it seemed as he was taken around in circles. "Alright. Also, do the other people in your country have the same abilities as you?" Albus needed to know how much of a threat Gaara was and if there were others who could pose a similar threat.

As much care went into the answer as the question, as Gaara tried to think of the correct answer. Either way he might be harmed. If he claimed no one else had his ability to manipulate sand, they might consider him less of a threat and attack him, whilst, if he said others had the power, they might attack him from fear of his race. It was difficult, until he came up with the perfect answer. The truth.

'Our abilities vary.'

"I see. Do your people know you are here? They might be worried." Dumbledore needed this question answered more than any other as this would determine the boy's threat level besides the startling power he had shown previously.

Gaara's reaction said it all and still didn't answer the question. It chilled the headmaster down to the bone, just as it had anyone else who was to see it. Gaara smiled.

'Probably, who's to say?'

"Gaara, how exactly do you move your sand? I haven't seen you touch your wand since you entered the school, and Lupin tells me that you didn't even have one until you had been taken to Ollivander's before term started."

Gaara held back another smirk at how untrained even one so old and experienced as the principal could be, that he didn't even notice that Gaara had been fiddling with the wand, under his sleeve, ever since he had received it. It was nothing short of incompetence.

'I don't need a wand to move my sand.'

"That's very impressive!" Dumbledore said smiling, "I also need to ask about what Professor Trelawney said yesterday, about you."

'Sorry. I don't know anything about what she said. Do you?' Gaara was telling a half truth as he could guess about a few of the basic references within the prophecy but the overall meaning was still unclear.

Dumbledore was truly impressed at this point as he knew he was being taken for a ride by the clever boy before him. "It's sad to say that none of us knows what it meant."

"One last thing, Mister Gaara. Could you refrain from carrying your gourd with you to classes from now on? The teachers don't think it's appropriate." Dumbledore said this with a hint of apprehension, due to the question having an obvious answer that he himself knew would be negative.

'No. It protects me.' It was about the reaction Albus had expected.

"Well, this has been enlightening. Thank you very much; I'm glad we could get to know each other a little better, Gaara." Albus smiled, and the boy sitting across from him noticed the twinkle in his eye start up like a flashlight reflected back at him. Gaara suddenly got the same feeling he had gotten when the irritating hat had tried to read his mind the night before.

The old man wasn't surprised when even a well-versed Legilimens like himself couldn't penetrate the boy's mind, though he didn't put too much force behind his mental attack as he would never forget the sorting hat's reaction to whatever was inside of Gaara's mind.

'Stay out of my mind.' The sand formed these words, surprising the recipient as he had rarely, if ever, been caught snooping through someone's mind before.

"M-my apologies. It's an old habit of mine." Dumbledore stood up; hating how much his knees hurt because of the weather, and nodded his head in further insincere apology.

"I'm afraid I have to be getting back to my work now." Albus stated, standing before Gaara. "Before I go, would you like a Sherbet Lemon?" After a final head shake, Gaara was lefty alone in the infirmary again as the headmaster walked out. It was a true pleasure to be alone sometimes; Gaara couldn't help but admit this to himself as he sat back in the bed, regretting, if only slightly, that he had passed up the sweet from the professor.

Gaara sighed as he unconsciously fiddled with his wand, glad to have been left with it instead of having it confiscated like his clothes seemed to have been.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Gaara didn't ever, in his wildest demon-fuelled nightmares, imagine that he would ever be so bored that he would fondly reminisce about the times he played 'Catch the Monster'. In his infinite and unending boredom, Gaara noticed that he had been thinking about a lot of the horrifying games he played as a child. Though, even the villagers didn't call them games, they were deadly serious in their desire to kill him. Gaara had begun calling them 'games' through his crippling loneliness and unfulfilled wishes to play or even be with others for the briefest moment. Though, that had ended when he started playing games with the villagers, inspired by 'mother'.

Still, back to the current problem, Gaara was starved for interest in the dull and empty hospital wing. It irked him, that, out of the last five days he had been in Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry, supposedly a place of wonder and awe, he had spent the last four days in the hospital wing on bed rest. He had tried to leave once or twice, but even his amazing shinobi skills couldn't evade the eagle-eyed Madam Pomfrey, who, despite her age and lack of formal training, could keep up with best of shinobi.

And thus, the red-haired ninja of the sand was stuck in the most boring section of the apparently wondrous school for magicians. All visitors had been turned away, most being curious irritants called students and a few actually being concerned classmates. In a whole different category were the trio of Gryffindors who seemed determined to get the answers they craved despite the detention they had received and the hefty amount of house points they had been docked.

The only other person, who had tried to visit Gaara that he knew of, was Draco Malfoy. He had also been turned away as Gaara was still deemed too injured to receive visitors; no matter how much Gaara himself denied this fact. As far as the tanuki-eyed boy was concerned, if he could walk, he was healed. Real shinobi didn't complain or stay in hospital with an almost mended broken leg and now only bruised arm, they got up and fought.

The only solace Gaara had was that his clothes had been returned to him, literally as good as new, the day before. However, on strict orders of the nurse, he was to remain in his hospital gown until he was released.

On the fifth day, he had been told that he was almost ready to be discharged and that he would be allowed out on the next day, which, he noticed, happened to be a Saturday.

Later that Friday night, the first visitor was admitted to see Gaara, mostly through blackmail and threats. From what Gaara could hear, Draco had threatened to send an owl to his father and have the nurse fired. Whilst Madam Pomfrey knew that even Lucius Malfoy couldn't have her fired, nor would Albus allow her to be harmed, she did respect the fact that the usually cold and distant Malfoy, who would often show nothing but malice to those he called 'friends', was now trying his hardest to see his newest acquaintance in their sick bed.

Poppy was not as cold-hearted as some of the others in the school, as she only saw a frail boy who had been hurt a lot in his life and needed help. That had been one of the largest reasons that she had been so insistent that the new student spend the majority of his first week in her care, as she could clearly see that not only were his unhealed injuries severe, but his previous ones were as well. He had numerous scars all over his body, not befitting a child of his age, and she couldn't stand to see him suffer anymore.

Gaara was actually pleased to see his sole peer acquaintance before him that night, having prayed to see just about anyone to alleviate his boredom, just short of Konoha's Green Beast. Draco took the chair next to Gaara's bed and moved it to the end so he could look directly at his peer, not willing to sit next to him like a commoner.

"I've tried to visit before but the stupid nurse wouldn't let me in. I swear, this is almost as bad as letting that bloody oaf teach Care of Magical Creatures." Draco said, riling himself up with just the thought. "I talked to my father and he said that he would have that idiot locked up. If he hadn't made you ride that bloody chicken, you wouldn't have fallen. And if it weren't for you, I might have lost my arm."

As much as Gaara disliked this form of communication, he decided it was necessary until he thought of a better one. The sand was already in a ball by the time Draco had noticed it was moving at all, and as he watched, the sand morphed into individual shapes, 'It wasn't his fault. Do not blame the groundskeeper.'

"What are you talking about? It was clearly his fault, by the time my fathe…" Draco trailed off, as he looked up at the new message written in sand.

'Placing blame is weak.'

Draco opened and closed his mouth in fury; being called weak was beyond ridiculous. He was the son of one of the most powerful men in the wizarding world; how could he be weak?

'The strong fight their own battles and never place blame, except with those who rightfully deserve it.'

This shut Malfoy up completely for a minute or two. Draco had never been told anything like this ever before. Sure, he had been called a wimp and a coward by Potter and his gang, but that was just them trying to insult him, wasn't it?

The inner tribulations continued until he broke his own train of thought with his latest mocking point for his nemesis. "I don't suppose you've heard, but that serial killer was spotted by Hogsmeade a few miles away." Draco began, and already Gaara was getting a bad feeling. "Yeah, Sirius Black's probably here to finish his job and kill Potter. Can't blame him."

Gaara grimaced, and almost face palmed, at the thought that Sirius had been spotted. Served him right, always going out for runs when he wasn't even hunting, it was only a matter of time.

"But that's not the weirdest thing." The Malfoy heir continued, "Crabbe and Goyle have both been avoiding me all week. Ever since they were let out of the hospital wing they've been acting terrified of me and won't come near me." If Gaara wasn't mistaken, he could swear he heard a little hurt in the platinum-blonde's voice.

The two conversed, albeit mostly one-sidedly, for the better part of an hour before the visitor was ushered out quite forcibly so that Gaara could have his last meal and sleep in the infirmary.

The last thing that they had talked about still echoed within both their minds long into the night due to the possible implications it held. Gaara had asked Draco, quite humbly in all of its written glory, if Draco could teach him the basics of spell casting.

Draco had been stunned that someone so clearly strong in so many ways would need help in basic magic. Gaara had explained half-heartedly that he had never used a wand before, having never needed to. Draco, still internally claiming to have no interest in such trivial matters as friendships, accepted the request under the pretence that it was merely because someone of his stature couldn't been seen to be alone all of the time and since his trusted goons had deserted him he needed a new companion.

Draco had offered his weekend to help Gaara train, having felt quite privileged, not a feeling he was unaccustomed to, to aid the boy who was clearly going to be a great wizard in no time. A perfect ally and a great example of his own abilities, to have taught a great wizard.

Gaara felt almost a sense of joy as he fell into his most deeply enjoyed state, at the thought that when he awoke, he would be free of the gatekeeper of the eighth-circle of hell, which had kept him in a perpetual state of boredom and half-death for the past week. Some might have claimed him to be melodramatic but he was a being who thrived on activity, having grown up as a warrior. It also didn't help that no matter how much he denied it, Gaara was influenced by the demon inside of him, only subtly but surely and Shukaku cried out for mischief.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Freedom; glorious freedom. Gaara literally ran out of the infirmary after he had been told he was allowed to leave, after he bowed to the woman who had cared for him. On his way out, after dressing, he strapped the sand back onto his back where it rightfully belonged before reforming his sand armour that had apparently been chiselled off of his body the night he had been admitted. The high-level shinobi had a little difficulty running, with the sand weighing him down, due to the healed broken bone. His leg, whilst almost completely fixed, was still sore and tender from its recent breakage so he was a little unsteady on his feet.

As soon as he had exited, he went straight to his room to find Draco. No matter how early in the morning it was, though it just happened to be just after six in the morning, Gaara was enough of a hard working ninja that he wasn't opposed to training near dawn. It was a new habit, the whole 'training' thing, but it seemed to help that guy with the bushy eye-brows so he decided that he would train until he was recognised; like _him_.

Draco, having had a long and boring first week back, had committed himself to a full morning's worth of sleep and relaxation followed by an hour or two of teaching Gaara how to use his wand in the evening. Draco was rich and privileged, used to a life of luxury, and he loved every second of it.

Gaara arrived back at the entrance of the Slytherin common room and stumbled across his first problem, the need to speak the password to gain entry. Gaara considered, briefly, the prospect of tunnelling through the entrance or one of the walls to get in, but decided against it as it would expose his sleeping quarters for the any intruder to just walk in. So, fighting his boredom once again, which had become a skill by this point, Gaara stood outside in the cold of the underbelly of the school for the next hour and a half, before one of the more studious teenagers had risen to get some breakfast on the first Saturday of the school year. The poor lad had almost fainted when he left his common room in the morning, expecting to see a handful of the other early risers out and about, only to find the scary new student, who had since been named Sabaku no Gaara, standing outside of the entrance of the Slytherin dorm in waiting. It was scary and Gaara didn't care as he walked past the frozen teen into the moderately warmer room to find his temporary sensei.

Draco hated many things: mud-bloods, Potter, Weasleys, Dumbledore, Potter, Divination, Hagrid, Potter, Crabbe & Goyle as of the past week, and Potter. But out of all of those insurmountable evils, the one thing Draco hated above all others was definitely being woken up early on his Saturday. When he was shaken, lightly, awake, he considered cursing the ghastly monster who would steal his precious time. But when he saw the ghastly monster, now identified as the recently released Gaara, he quickly decided against cursing the boy who was looking at him with something akin to disdain, if one was able to determine any emotional shift from the stoic face.

"What?" Draco said, not quite awake enough to put in place the proper etiquette required when talking with peers due to his tired state. "Go back to sleep if Pomfrey kicked you out of the hospital wing." commanded the Malfoy, as he turned over.

Gaara was not impressed to find someone whom he had respected, of all of the wizards he'd met, sleeping in so late and acting so grumpily in the morning, especially for a civilian; it wasn't as if he had to do any real work during the week.

Gaara assumed it would take a lot more to wake up the grouchy teen so he uncorked his sand and sent a tendril to sweep the young wizard off of his bed and onto the floor.

That woke him up.

"What is it that you need so early in the morning!" Draco had regained some of his proper composure after he swept himself off of the floor and wiped the sleep from his eyes, realising that he wouldn't be going back to sleep if the boy with the gourd had anything to do with it.

Gaara held up his wand and gave it a flick to gesture his desire to learn and practice its use. This earned a shocked and exasperated open-mouthed look from Draco who had assumed Gaara couldn't find his way to the dining room, or some other relatively normal problem, though, still not enough of a good reason to wake him up. To find out that the new student wanted to start leaning so early was like a ton of bricks falling on his head, make that two tons considering Draco agreed to tutor the boy in the first place.

"But it's seven-thirty in the morning!" Draco whined as he attempted futilely to get back into his warm and comfy bed, only to be pushed back onto his feet by the same sand tendril that he would curse until the day he died… or woke up fully.

Gaara gave him an even look before throwing Draco's clothes at him, the latter having laid them out next to his bed the night before so he would have even less work to do on his most holy of days.

Grumbling to himself the entire time, Draco dressed himself while Gaara considered whether or not he would need his throwing knives and exploding tags. A quick look back to Draco who had just fallen over in the process of entering his trousers confirmed his sufficiency with just the wand and his ever present sand.

Twenty minutes after entering the room, Gaara left with the slouching Draco following soon after at a slower pace. By the time they had reached the gigantic front door of the castle, Draco was walking in his usual snobbish way, the only sign of his discontent was the dark circles around his eyes and the almost silent mumblings to himself of how much he hated being awake.

As they walked, some of the Gaara fan-club, which had been watching the doors of the infirmary for the past week in hopes of seeing the release of their idol, were shocked to see Gaara and Draco walk right past them. Each night they were ushered away at curfew and each morning they would return anew until they had to get to a class. The few that were just making their way to the great hall for breakfast were amazed to see not only Gaara out and about, but Draco sporting the new must-have look: racoon-eyes. Pretty soon everyone would be using eye liner to achieve the insomniac look.

Draco didn't appreciate all of the looks and giggles he got as he made his way out of the castle and onto the grounds. He could have sworn he heard someone laugh at his eyes; it wasn't his fault he had bags under his eyes. He was tired. What he didn't hear was that they were talking about how even the great and mighty Draco was following Gaara.

The noble Slytherin had asked Gaara if they could go and have breakfast first but the other had shook his head and carried on. As far as Draco was concerned, this was not shaping up to be a good day. Tired, hungry and mocked; he was certainly having a terrible Saturday. Still, he supposed he would get to see a prodigy learn to use his wand.

They arrived at a secluded grassy area soon after leaving the gates of the castle, having trekked a little further than usual to avoid any prying eyes. Draco stood in front of Gaara and decided to start with what the obviously gifted exchange student knew.

"So, if I'm going to teach you, I need to know what you already know." Draco said, waiting to hear about all of the advanced spells the boy knew and what basic ones he had overlooked.

Gaara shrugged his shoulder, probably for the first time in his life.

Draco gaped.

It took a few minutes to regain full brain function after that startling confession. He had to be sure, "Are you saying you don't know anything about spell casting?" The incredulity in the older boy's voice was as obvious as his bright hair.

Gaara nodded his head, feeling their first warning signs of embarrassment coming on.

"Well…I guess we'll have to start with some of the most basic spells. Wait, how are you not able to use magic yet you come from a pureblood family?"

Again Gaara shrugged, which he imagined would be a time saver for the future.

"Never mind," Draco said, not fully believing what he was being told but, knowing that saying anything wouldn't do him any good. "In any case, one of the first spells we learnt here was the floating charm." Draco took out his wand and gestured for Gaara to do the same. "Now repeat after me: ' _Wingardium Leviosa_ '…" Draco said before catching his mistake and looking Gaara who looked back at him evenly, trying to hide his humour as he waited for his tutor to catch his mistake and realise that he couldn't speak much less copy his words. "…Sorry. I guess you'll just have to use non-verbal magic. Just imagine the words in your head and copy the wand movements. It takes greater control and a lot more skill but that shouldn't be a problem for you."

"So, imagine the words ' _Wingardium Leviosa_ ' and at the same time, swish and flick your wand like this. _Wingardium Leviosa_." Draco demonstrated on a rock lying on the ground, levitating it into the air before his face before dropping the spell sending it plummeting back down to Earth.

Gaara watched with avid fascination at the simple trick, and then looked at his jet-black wand. Swish and flick, Gaara practiced the motion before focussing his intent on a rock the size of Hagrid's head a few feet away. ' _Wingardium Leviosa_ ' He thought to himself as he focussed a small amount of chakra into the wand. Swish and flick.

The rock started to rise a foot or so in the air, Draco looking on in awe as the heavy object was lifted without even the smallest sign of strain from the caster. The boulder was at eye level and Gaara hadn't even blinked in exertion, however, the rock started to shake precariously at which point Draco thought that even holding it so long was admirable. But soon after the shaking started there was an almighty explosion as the rock blew up right in their faces. Fortunately, like always, the sand shield protected Gaara automatically, only needing a little extra chakra to extend its protection to his friend.

"Why the bloody hell did you do that?" Screamed Draco, checking himself over for splinters and fragments of stone.

Another shrug was Gaara's honest answer, as he had done exactly what he had been told. He turned to his left and lifted his wand again, aiming for a rock further away this time and supplying as little chakra as he could. He repeated the spell and the effect was as violent as before

"Are you sure you're saying the right spell in your head?" Draco asked looked almost accusingly at his pupil who looked a little sheepish even when he nodded. It wasn't like Gaara to act sheepish but the entire experience of spell casting had been humbling, even if it was only the two instances.

"Okay, maybe we should try something a little easier." The Platinum-blonde said, trying to think of the simplest spell he knew. The problem was, he couldn't think of anything simpler than the floating charm. Even near-squibs like Longbottom could cast it. "Aha!" Cried Draco, the finger that had been resting on his chin was now pointing into the air in triumph. "Try the _Lumos_ spell." Draco said in happiness. Whilst the spell was a third year level, it was remarkably easy to perform and required very little magic to get at least a small glimmer of light.

Draco demonstrated, saying that Gaara should put as much magic as he could, into the magic to see what his power level was.

Gaara, not seeing any problem with gauging the level of his 'magic', copied the motion and forced his vast amounts of chakra into the strong black wood. Both of the teens had expected a similar or smaller ball of light than Draco's, Gaara assuming that one needed more chakra to perform a spell than a jutsu. The outcome was unexpected. The ball of light was blindingly white, like a sun at the end of his wand that starkly contrasted the black of the wand itself. The flash didn't last long, having been cancelled by Gaara's lack of concentration when he went to shield his eyes.

"What the hell are you doing?" Draco was absolutely fuming at the problems he was facing. "How did you do that with a simple _Lumos_ spell?" The fact that Gaara's light spell was so bright wasn't the issue, most wizards could perform one that luminous, but to do so during the day with the sun high in the sky was beyond imagining.

"This time, put as little power as you can into it…"

The lesson wore on all day and stopped only when the hunger-driven stomach cramps became too much for the young pureblood. So much for his perfect Saturday…

The next day followed much the same pattern, with Draco trying, desperately; to teach Gaara to control his magic and power-down his spells, that seemed far too powerful for an untrained wizard. By the end of the second day, with so much blood and sweat put into it, the Malfoy child was close to tears of happiness, when Gaara was able to levitate a small rock without blowing it up for the first time.

The rock hit the ground, however, when the tanuki-host's attention was drawn to the crowd of people, standing all around them at quite a distance, started clapping and cheering at the, supposedly private, achievement. Now, Gaara was no stranger to the odd compliment or crowd of fans every once in a while, ever since the Konoha vs. Suna conflict; but when he saw one characteristic in many of the observers, he started to run, hoping that Draco would follow. The terrifying characteristic, shared by many people within the audience were a pair of drawn on black rings around their eyes, similar to the ones Gaara was born with, though he would always vehemently deny that he was born with the racoon look, in favour of the insomniac-excuse.

He would not stand idle as the swarm of fangirls descended upon him and his teacher/friend, so he ran for his life and for his sanity.

When they finally came to a stop, safe within the confines of the Slytherin dorms, Draco panted heavily before asking "Who were they?"

Deeming this a serious enough question to answer, Gaara wrote out one word, simple enough, in sand, 'Fangirls.'

"Enough said."

That night, Draco slept like a baby, hoping beyond hope that he would be able to sleep past seven o'clock next weekend. Gaara, on the other hand, was hoping that none of his lessons would call on him to do any high calibre spells for a while, at least until he was able to control his power better.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

The next morning was a slow Monday start, everyone trying to get out of bed before they were swallowed by their covers and forced to stay in all day; which, as tempting as a day in bed sounded, was unlikely to please their irritable head of house, who had been in an extra bad mood this year. The roommates with hairs as red as blood and as bright as the sun, were just as slow to rise as everybody else. Draco being the normal teenager he was, no matter how much he denied, it couldn't find the exit to his bed no matter how hard he looked. And Gaara was sure he'd forgotten how to stand up, but wasn't willing to test his theory for another hour or so. Eventually, after another ten minutes of refusing to accept the reality that they would be getting up, both did rise to the occasion when they realised that the lesson they would be late for, permitting they had stuck with the original plan of skiving, would be Potions with Professor Snape. It wasn't like Gaara was afraid of the man, as he had pretty much proven he could defend himself against the man's spells, but he did respect that the man was his teacher for the time being and wasn't willing to show that much disrespect, especially when he had covered the potions lab with slime the week before.

Breakfast was an uneventful meal, being that everyone involved was either too tired or studious to bother anybody else at that time in the morning. As they ate breakfast, Gaara saw Remus Lupin enter the back entrance to the great hall looking as sickly and pale as ever, which he could sympathize with. However, he had some business with the acquaintance that couldn't wait much longer. He waited patiently for Remus' eyes to look at him, during the teacher's surveillance of the Great Hall, at which time he gestured for Lupin to meet him outside with a stiff head nod.

Outside of the hall, Lupin looked around as he exited the giant wooden doors, finding the boy he was looking for in one of the many nooks the castle had; the perfect place for secret meeting of a less than reputable nature.

"Good morning Gaara. I'm glad to see you're doing well. I wanted to come and see you in the hospital but I wasn't in the best health myself." Lupin looked ashamed by his neglect of his obligations, which Gaara thought was an overreaction but didn't dwell on something so insignificant.

'What is Sirius doing?' Gaara sand had zoomed out before the older of the two had even noticed. It was amazing how easily people in the wizarding world adapted to change despite their apparently ancient customs.

"I imagine you are referring to the sighting a few days ago." Lupin suddenly looked even more tired at the thought of their mutual friend's antics. "I haven't had a chance to talk to him yet but I assume he was merely bored. Always was an impulsive person. Caused unimaginable trouble for the four of us…" Gaara tuned out again as the tales of the stories about Lupin's childhood sprang up.

When Lupin had finished explaining something about a stink bomb, Fanged-Frisbee and an unfortunately placed family heirloom, Gaara turned back in and asked his next question, 'When can I see _him_?'

"There is a trip to Hogsmeade coming up soon, you can use it for cover and meet up with him then. You're going to have to sneak out of the castle, though, as you don't have your permission slip signed." The man said looking thoughtful. He had to think of which passage for Gaara to take that would be the least risky. The Whomping Willow route seemed a little risky for the boy, him being so small and frail looking. On the other hand, he was more than proficient with his sand and he had heard rumours that the boy had seriously powerful magic as well, if only a little unrefined. A few teachers had started to watch Gaara's lessons along with the students after the numerous explosions the day before. "The passage you should take is out by-"

"Mister Gaara, I do believe you're going to be late for my class; you'd better get going." Snape interrupted with the haughty look of derision that seemed as common place on his face as the look of illness of Remus'. "And Remus, are you determined to corrupt an already detestable child. You," He turned to Gaara with nothing less than pure contempt, "get to lesson before I give you enough detentions that by the time you leave, you'll, at last, be the same height as a six year old."

Gaara, in no mood to stay and listen to more ranting from the hateable man, walked calmly away, calling his sand back into its proper resting place.

"You had better be getting to your class too, Remus." Severus sneered. His triumphant look of superiority over the secret werewolf was cut down to size when he noticed Lupin looking elsewhere. The man leaned out into the hallway, past Snape's bewildered face, and called out to the retreating gourd/back of Gaara, "See you later Lily!"

Lupin then walked off without even looking at Severus' enraged face, and onto his first class of the day. First years... too easy.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Class went better than the week before, Gaara managing to stay until the end of the lesson this time without destroying anything larger than a cauldron and a cauldron sized section of a desk. Though, if Snape seemed irritable before his encounter with his old school rival, he was utterly ferocious after.

Fortunately, the rest of the day was more agreeable to all those involved after the unpleasant Potions class. Even Care of Magical Creatures was a happier experience for Gaara, though it would have been difficult for him to have had a worse time in the class considering the precedent set last week. They observed a herd of unicorns, which seemed a little too fond of Gaara for his liking, as they relentlessly followed him around despite his silent protests and urges to use deadly force on them.

The next day was worse than the day before but still much better than almost dying from falling hundreds of feet onto the forest floor and hitting every tree branch on the way down. Gaara had to work through a third year charms class with no magical talent and far too much raw power. Suffice to say, that he was averaging one classroom destroyed per week so far this term.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

"Can anybody tell me what is inside of this wardrobe?" Lupin asked his third year Defence Against the Dark Arts class.

"It's a Boggart, sir." Hermione Granger piped up, surprising several students with her sudden unexpected presence there.

"And can anybody tell me what a Boggart looks like?" The natural teacher again questioned his students as he looked at the faces around the room; Potter, check, Malfoy, check, Weasley, check, Granger, check, Lily, check, and check. All of the key players were there and ready. They were vital as they were all important to him in one way or another, if only by association. The week before had just been introductions to the class and the syllabus, so this week was the first real test of his teaching ability.

"Nobody knows what a Boggart looks like, as they assume the form of whatever the person closest to them fears the most." Again, Granger answered, reciting her perfect knowledge of most academia flawlessly.

"Correct!" Lupin announced, pleased that there was some base knowledge floating around in the pool of young minds. "There is a very simple way to defeat a Boggart, laughter."

The lesson continued as the Slytherins listened as raptly as everyone else, only when they heard they would be facing one of the monsters themselves. Gaara was genuinely interested about what some of his so-called peers were most deeply afraid of, himself included. As well as Gaara thought he knew himself, he honestly couldn't tell what his greatest fear would be. Though he had a big sand-monster-hunch as to what it could be.

Gaara thoughts were disturbed by the gramophone starting up, with a jazzy tune that sent the students into a rhythm as they lined up and began to face their fears, cast the ' _Riddikulus_ ' spell and laugh the monster into submission ready for the next person.

Gaara was standing behind Draco and in front of a handful of Gryffindors, which he was silently thankful for as he was actually looking forward to facing the one-tailed beast, and he knew that if Harry Potter were to have his go first, then a certain infamous Dark Lord might appear and that would just ruin the lesson for the rest of the class.

Next up was Draco who looked nervous, which was turned into terror when the Boggart turned into the one person he feared the most: his father. The tall and strict looking man wore sharp robes and held an even sharper cane, scowling at Draco the whole time. Soon enough the man was walking quickly forwards, towards a stunned Draco. The son was so afraid that he couldn't bring himself to raise his wand against his father, even when the father raised his cane, ready to strike him around the face.

Gaara surveyed the room and found half the class afraid, Slytherins, and half the class with looks of hatred, the Gryffindors. It seemed Boggarts were nothing if not informative.

"Draco, you know the spell." Lupin said encouragingly, ready to step in if necessary.

" _Riddi-Riddik-Riddikulus_ " The defending boy stammered, still not able to pull off the charm. Gaara, deciding he wasn't willing to see his friend's father hit his friend in the face with the cane, no matter how funny it may have been, pushed passed the quivering teen to face his fear and beat the sand out of it.

The Boggart shivered before jumping into the air and started to spasm and shift before him. The shape that was left over after the change landed back on the floor surprisingly softly, making black rimmed eyes widen. Gaara's mouth opened and the slightest whisper met the ears of others around the room, indiscriminate to merely a whimper at the sight of…

To be continued.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Omake:

Madam Pomfrey had been the nurse at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry for many, many years now; more years than she would like to admit. And, in all of the years that she had been tending to the sick and injured of the student body, she had never had so much trouble as she had had with Sabaku no Gaara. Well, other than the occasional escape attempt, as amicable as they were, he was as silent as a mouse the rest of the time. However well behaved Gaara may have been under her care, the fan-club that was stalking and harassing him was not so nice.

There had been ten times as many break-in attempts as there had been breakouts in the past week. She was tired, having to defend from the rampant fandom that had spread like wildfire from the silent mysterious red-haired teen.

It was after the fourth day that she finally started hexing the students who broke her perimeter; they weren't injured before they got into the infirmary but they would be by the time they left. She only treated the students who needed immediate care or were polite; sadly it was almost always the former, Gaara being a rare example of the latter.

The mute teenager's manners were the main reason she had insisted on keeping him so much longer than necessary in her care. The other reason was that he was so small and thin; she couldn't help but fuss over him, especially when he denied his need of her help so vehemently.

Still, when she had to let Gaara go, due to Albus, Remus and Minerva's insistence, she was sure to let Molly Weasley know about Gaara. She could not watch Gaara when he was outside of Hogwarts, wherever he would go, but she knew Mrs Weasley, whom she had several dealings with previously regarding Mrs Weasley's unruly children, would certainly.

On his way out, making a new record for quickest escape from a hospital, Gaara bowed in his ever-silent thanks.

Pomfrey looked around and shed a little tear… as she surveyed the damages done by the fangirls coupled with the copious amounts of sand all over the place. He was such a nice lad but so very messy.

 


	4. A New Perspective

 

Sabaku no Gaara stood stock-still as he stared into the eyes of the newly formed Boggart that was slowly stepping towards him in the leisurely manner that one might expect from a carefree visitor on a light afternoon stroll, except, the Boggart had a much more sinister purpose in its stride as it approached Gaara; walking directly at the trembling shinobi who hadn't moved an inch since the monster's terrible formation.

To the many fascinated observers of the event, they mightn't have understood Gaara's deep rooted despair at the sight of the approaching figure, having not heard of the boy's sordid past, but even they, as fickle as the student body could be, were aware of the terror within the Gaara's usually opaque eyes. The approaching human shape was certainly not what they had expected from the previously fantastical exchange student's Boggart but nonetheless they watched it raptly.

The human shape, apparently a woman, had reached her destination with a gentle smile upon her face. Gaara's wide eyes couldn't even blink at the face of Karura, whom he had only seen in photographs and yet, she had had the most profound of consequences on his life.

Sabaku no Karura, Gaara's mother.

Of all of the figures and scenarios within the demon host's memory, he had never imagined that she would be the fear he was shown. It wasn't that he didn't understand the horror he was feeling; he had just been so terrified of the mere thought, that he just couldn't comprehend it.

The Boggart with the delicate woman's face bent down and hugged the rigid shinobi, hands weaving around his petite form with seemingly practiced ease. Gaara wasn't in the state of mind one might expect from a child being reunited with their dead mother, and for good reason soon revealed. The Boggart was in fact, a manifestation of one's fears based upon that person's ideas and perceptions. In essence, Gaara's mother was there because he was afraid of the idea of her being there, because he had always known exactly what she would say to him, deep down in his heart.

"Professor, who is that?" Hermione whispered, concerned that the dangerous creature that she had watched transform into the various grotesqueries of the human mind, was now hugging the clearly uncomfortable, if not afraid, red-headed boy.

"I don't know… I've never seen her before." Lupin was truthfully bewildered by the unusual behaviour of the Boggart that was leaning in to Gaara's ear and whispering something to him. At the first sign of trouble or danger, he would intervene and stop the creature, even if he had to reveal his own fear in doing so, but until then he would wait and see what happened. It wasn't like Lupin to endanger a friend for the sake of his curiosity; however, he was ashamed to admit that even he was wary of the student whom had appeared in a flurry of sand and intrigue.

Gaara wasn't nearly as aware as his classmates, his eyes only registering almost grey hair covering his vision like a veil of misty uncertainty, bad memories and despicable motives. The hug, that had started so lovingly, had turned into a desperate clutching as the fake started to whisper into his ear disturbing things that he knew to be true and yet had still shied away from.

"My little Gaara, my beautiful little Gaara. You've been such a naughty child, not killing anyone... You know that's your purpose; you are a tool for genocide. That's why I gave you your name." The Boggart Karura sung caringly into Gaara's ear, describing all of his worst insecurities and destabilizing his only recently formed sanity at its very core.

'No, no, no!' Gaara howled inside of his head, furiously wishing he could scream that denial at the top of his lungs.

"It's okay now, my Gaara. Your mother will take care of you now; we'll kill them all together. We'll keep on killing until you and I are the only two left." The Boggart, whom Gaara had forgotten was merely an echo of truth, was now in front of his face, staring into his eyes with all of the love he had been denied throughout his childhood. The worst part was that during the disturbing speech, in which he could hear Shukaku literally shrieking in agreement, he truly wanted to please her.

He felt so very happy in the warm embrace of his mother. It wasn't like Gaara to lose track of himself so easily, especially since he had separated his mind from the Ichibi's, but the emotional blowback of the encounter was draining all of his self control until he was nothing more than the weapon he had strived so hard to distance himself from.

"I love you so much Gaara, I always have, despite what your father did to us. I always loved you." Karura, although fake, pulled Gaara to her chest and finally he succumbed and encircled his smaller arms around her, clinging to his mother's breast and wishing it never had to end, wishing that he didn't have to kill again but knowing he had no choice. Gaara closed his eyes, preparing for the attack that he was about to make, knowing how much it was going to hurt him later, he steeled himself for the kill.

"You know what you have to do, Gaara. Do it for your mother." She whispered as the cork on the gourd popped off and dispersed into more sand, joined by the large amounts now flowing freely out of the container.

'Yes, mother.' Gaara could only whisper in his own head as he flexed his control of the tendril, which had hardened enough to pierce even the strongest defence, not that it would have to.

The witches and wizards present couldn't help but tense as the tentacle waved around the embracing pair, all still perplexed by the entire situation. A sense of danger radiated from the scene, enough so that even the most dim-witted teenager could feel the impending violence on an instinctual level.

'Yes, mother.' Gaara repeated, Shukaku's screams becoming almost deafening as he struck.

Hermione gasped, as the sand spear pierced the female chest, one that belonged to a woman who looked both unsurprised and thankful for the aggression. The young witch thought she saw a resemblance to Gaara in the pale woman's face but was in no state of mind to dwell on such details when he had attacked said woman seemingly unprovoked. She had to remind herself, as did all of the students that it wasn't really a person they were seeing impaled, no matter how real the blood appeared, but a Boggart.

Everyone watched as the now limp form fell gently onto Gaara, who was holding her against him, the roles reversed as she leaned her head from his shoulder slightly to whisper one last thing.

All present saw the Boggart speak a dying message to Gaara, and yet no one could make out a single word. All anyone could discern was that whatever she had told him, it brought a smile to Gaara's face, as he silently thought in reply, 'I know.'

No one moved, no one spoke; the entire class was frozen as Gaara moved the body of the, now dead, Boggart to the floor, still maintaining the sad and yet so very sincere smile that didn't hold the same apathy or loathing that his previous facial expressions had held; no, this was a transcendental smile that had never been seen before and was seldom seen again by the residents of Hogwarts.

The sand was recalled into its resting place as the owner turned away from his peers and walked out of the classroom. The body of the Boggart started to spasm before exploding in a cloud of smoke, leaving nothing behind but bad memories and startled third years.

Not a soul saw Gaara for several hours after the incident, and, by no coincidence, not one person saw him shed a single tear that night.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Like all good rumours, the story of Gaara's encounter with the Boggart had spread within the first ten minutes to all four corners and houses of Hogwarts; not even the teachers were spared from the gossiping as they too chattered amongst themselves about the strange and disconcerting student who had become even more interesting than their resident miracle maker, Harry Potter, who'd had a fairly mundane start to the school year by comparison despite the dementor attack.

The centre of attention had become even more reserved than before, after his last Defence Against the Dark Arts lesson, if that were even possible. Lupin was just thankful for two things: no students had been hurt, and he hadn't had his classroom destroyed like the teacher's poll would have suggested. There had been five-to-one odds that he would be teaching outside for the rest of the week. Fortunately, Lupin had had enough faith in Gaara to bet on his classroom's survival, and had made a killing as a result.

The only teacher exempt from such rumour milling and gossip mongering was the ever-stoic and hate filled Severus Snape, whom had, at first, listened to the various accounts of the story before distancing himself from the matter entirely after the truth had turned to exaggeration and lies from the Chinese-whispers that were being relayed to him.

Dumbledore had tried in earnest to resolve the issue by confronting it again, to little effect. It seemed that the matter was of a sensitive and personal nature to Gaara as all questions either met a glare or feigned preoccupation. Albus had decided, before his questioning, that he wouldn't suggest any of his theories to Gaara, as, if he was wrong, or if he was right, it might end dangerously. He knew he had an upset teenager on his hands and the last thing he needed was an angry student who scared him more than he would ever like to admit. The only solace that the aged and wised man could take was that Gaara had been grounded to some level social norms by his apparent friendship with Draco Malfoy, though the term 'friend' wasn't really all that suitable considering the red-head's continuing distance and overall antisocial nature. The professor wasn't all too sure whether he should be concerned over the two teens bonding or not. He would have to wait and see, after all, he still had his contacts at the ministry to fall back on if matters grew out of his control, no matter how much he wished to avoid that instance.

The platinum-blonde nobility of the Slytherin house had managed, with some considerable effort, to keep regular contact with his roommate after the fiasco of a few days prior that had threatened to sever what little connection he had to the boy he now considered to be his, for lack of a better term, friend. To that end, he had practically dragged the silent and sombre boy to the first-year flying lessons that Gaara had not had the benefit of attending two years previously; he had been elsewhere at the time, apparently.

When Gaara had first learnt of the wizarding hobby of riding broomsticks, he had decided that witches and wizards were crazy. It wasn't that Gaara doubted Sirius when he had mentioned flying cleaning equipment, after all, the young shinobi had heard of much stranger methods of travel in his own world, but the concept of actually using the method of transport on a regular basis, and for fun, seemed ludicrous.

It hadn't been a fortnight since his fall from the much sturdier magical flying creature, and it had had a profound effect on Gaara's trust in the wizarding community's sense of self preservation when it came to their flying implements. Suffice to say, Gaara was not going to be getting on one of those waiting concussions.

So, when the red-haired teenager found himself straddling the wooden broom, he questioned just how persuasive his roommate really was. He looked to his left and saw Draco had a thin smile set upon his lips, though, it was much happier than his previously malicious ones that had been a regular sight for the new student. To his right, Gaara saw the thirty-or-so first years all holding their brooms as tightly and fearfully as the seasoned killing-machine. It would have been a lie to say that said killing-machine wasn't embarrassed about his skittishness, but after the time he'd been having recently, he wasn't in any mood to let pride take charge in place of safety.

However, despite his housemate's heavy protests against the decision, Gaara had adamantly refused to leave his sand-filled gourd on the ground. It wasn't that he was afraid it would be broken again, after all, he could fix it almost instantaneously, but he definitely wasn't going to fall from such a height again any time soon without the protection of his trusted lifeline.

The entire subject of Gaara's inability to ride a broom had been raised when the related subject of Quidditch had been brought up with as much enthusiasm as Gaara had ever seen someone so stoic as Draco use. The pureblood had been absolutely engrossed by the topic, wherein he had gone into great detail on the wonders of not only amateur playing but also the professional sport. Gaara really did regret shaking his head when asked if he had played the game before, leading to Draco, incredulous at the admittance, asking if Gaara even knew how to ride a broom.

The young wizard didn't know what was true anymore, having been informed that the supposed pureblood didn't know the most basic of skills that he himself had been taught at age seven. What perplexed the haughty noble the most was that even though he had doubts about Gaara's birth status, that didn't dissuade him from pursuing a friendship with the boy. It just didn't make sense to Draco, who had been raised with only the concept of social climbing as a reason to bond with peers.

It was a strange coincidence that not only Draco but Gaara also was feeling the odd sensation of an impending companionship. It was the real reason he had agreed to risking his life on the insanity that passed for wizarding pastimes. If it had been any other person, he would have flat-out refused, but with Draco he felt a tinge of guilt. As an unexpected side-effect of Gaara's proximity to Draco, more than just Crabbe & Goyle had deserted him as the entire school had begun to give the platinum-blonde the same wide-birth as himself. Whilst he knew it would be beneficial in the long run, to remove the multitude prejudiced and discriminatory purebloods who would spit on you as soon as look at you; however it did not escape the shinobi's notice that since he had been shunned from all of his social circles and left alone, Draco had begun to hang around him a lot more. It pained Gaara to know that he was the cause of someone else's pain and loneliness, especially someone like Draco who, despite his dark upbringing, was a genuinely good person, if a little abrasive and misled at times.

Brought back to his current predicament by a tap on the shoulder, Gaara turned to see Draco looking predictably peeved at being ignored for the last few minutes. The pale boy had been asking about Gaara's past again, only for the sake of learning more of his acquaintance, rather than for any more sinister reasons. Still, when he had been completely blanked by the mute mystery, he had become quite perturbed.

This had been yet another proof of Draco's inner goodness. That he was actually able to approach and touch Gaara on the shoulder showed that he had no evil intentions, or at least he had no killing intent towards Gaara. That had been why Yashamaru had never been able to get close enough to kill Gaara when he was a child, having to resort to more forceful methods in place of subterfuge. Shaking off morbid thoughts of the past, Gaara paid attention to Madam Hooch, who had begun her beginner's guide to flying. She hadn't really acknowledged the third years' presences in her class as she knew how much of a hassle a Malfoy could be when angered, and that would only spell annoyance for her later on; besides, she had also succumbed to the puzzle of the transfer student and was genuinely curious as to whether he would be able to fly after the stories of his magical ineptitude had circulated the staff table during dinnertime.

Following the provided instructions, both teens kicked off of the ground, one of them half-expecting to fall straight back down onto his knees, only to be surprised to find he was floating a foot or two over the grass on the wooden shaft of the broom.

Draco then leaned over and said "Come on, let's leave these kiddies and go do some real flying." The pure mirth in the boy's voice was enough to convince the unsteady ninja to follow slowly on his broom, away from the group of bewildered first years who had been expecting them to stay for more than the first five minutes. Truthfully, Draco had only encouraged Gaara to come to the first years' lesson because he thought it was the only way he could make the terrified Jinchuriki think it would be safe to leave terra firma.

They hovered around to the back of the school, Gaara having little to no clue where he was being led, save for the inkling that the destination was going to require a life threatening lesson. The tanuki-boy's expectations were proven true when he laid his large eyes on the gigantic stadium before him. It was close to the size of the Chunin-exam stadium, but it was far larger in terms of airspace. The grass pitch at the bottom looked like it had seldom been stood on before, which could very well have been true considering that the majority of time spent in Hogwarts' Quidditch pitch was spent on a broom in the sky. The towering wooden structures, ready to house the teaching staff and guests of the school, were still bare and without covering as the year had only just begun and the first match of the season was still more than a month away.

They each floated into the middle of the expansive area before Draco began to fly around a little more energetically, losing the patience that was so desperately needed to get Gaara to go higher than a few feet.

Calming slightly when he acknowledged his own immature behaviour, Draco dropped back down to eye level and started to goad the off-worlder into going higher, continuing his immaturity, though now acknowledged and accepted, to which, at first, Gaara merely refused, having no intention of killing himself. It wasn't that he was afraid of heights, it was just the methods in which he reached them that set him on edge.

Eventually, Gaara caved into the incessant whining that had turned from gentle persuasion to childish teasing. Ashamedly, Gaara succumbed to the childish form of coercion as he pulled upwards on the end of the wooden pole. Unfortunately, there had been an oversight on Gaara's part that Draco had also failed to notice; that being the large gourd, equal in size to Gaara himself, and filled to the brim with ground up rocks, was far too heavy for any broom to lift, magical or no. Gaara had tried to fly straight upwards upon his roommate's example but had only reached the staggering altitude of five feet before beginning to tip backwards and fall.

The object that had single-handedly doomed the ascension was also the object that saved the participant from doing a number on his recently healed tail bone. The sand burst from the container with lightning speed to cushion the, albeit minor yet still unpleasantly nostalgic, descent. Thanks to the blanket of golden granules under his back, Gaara had barely even felt the impact and was moving back to his feet again momentarily.

"Take that…thing off, and try again." Draco said; coming back down like the proverbial yoyo he seemed to be imitating as of the past few minutes. The Slytherin seeker had stumbled on his description of the gourd which, to his dismay, remained an ongoing enigma to him. He had tried on several occasions, even more so after the Boggart-incident, to discover something, anything about Gaara but the only thing he had managed to rip from the clutches of Gaara's paranoia was that the boy had been a 'Shinobi' where he came from and that they excelled in wandless magic. What a shinobi was, and the infinite number of other unanswered questions still plagued the forefront of Malfoy's mind.

Gaara shook his head, not willing to entertain the thought of riding the broom, which had already proven itself to be unsafe in his mind, without his protection. Gaara looked down at the borrowed broom in his hand, a far cry from Draco's Nimbus 2001, the end fraying and the length looking ready to buckle under a normal student's weight, much less his considerable bulk when including the mass of the sand on his back. The boy himself, being of a rather diminutive stature, weighed very little, not that he would ever admit any such weaknesses. The tiny Jinchuriki threw the broom off to the side petulantly when his patience ran thin, though he was careful not to put too much force behind his throw as to break the tool, as it was not his safety-hazard to break.

Before he could leave Draco to calm down over the next few hours, said flying teen made his last effort to persuade his associate to stay, "Come on, don't be such a coward."

Refusing to rise again to such an obvious jibe at his otherwise proud demeanour, Gaara started to walk away, having no further reason to stay. He was sure he would reconcile with his bed-neighbour at some point, but for the moment he was a little too…mad? Embarrassed? He wasn't sure what he was feeling at being called out, regarding his apparent fear of flying by wizarding means. Still, it was understandable that after the weeks he'd had, including no less than three falls, he developed a fear of a reoccurrence. Admittedly, the first had been due to an unknown kinjutsu and he'd been close to unconscious at the time and the third had been a few feet into soft sand, but the fact remained that his phobia seemed to have ingrained itself.

As Gaara was exiting through one of the various holes in the border of the stadium's perimeter, he heard the rushing of wind behind him. Not an unfamiliar sound, almost reminiscent of his home; the tanuki-host turned to see Draco whizzing around through the air at break-neck speeds. What really caught his attention was the look on his face. Unlike most, who would have just seen a blur in place of the flying-nobility, Gaara's trained eyes caught sight of the unbridled joy on Malfoy's face, Gaara's earlier rebuffing of him notwithstanding. Draco seemed to have overcome his crippling loneliness as he soared freely, seemingly finding some measure of contentment that Gaara himself was relatively unfamiliar with and yet could still empathise fully with the sentiment.

Gaara was well aware of the mask that Draco had been forced to wear for many years and as such, any emotion or action was fiercely guarded. So, for Draco to smile and reveal such happiness whilst unaware of being observed meant that it was at least genuine. Most of the time, when Draco didn't know he was being watched, he would usually just scowl and work, but this was a sure sign that the potentially evil child had at least an escape from his villainy.

An idea formed in Gaara's mind, and, to even his surprise, it wasn't about murdering or maiming the winner of the 'Hogwarts-Greasiest-Professor' award. Pushing through his reservations on the thought of doing anymore flying in this world, Gaara called out his sand platform, using all of it to make a sturdy surface for him to stand on as he was carried upwards and back onto the Quidditch field.

Draco was shocked to see his roommate return after his dramatic exit only a few minutes prior, immediately changing his facial expression to a more socially acceptable one of a slight frown; a tiny improvement upon his usual downright scowl but a telltale sign of happiness for the returning ninja to spot.

The broom riding teen cast a casual glance towards Gaara's preferred form of transportation before disregarding it as another of the scary roommate's eccentricities, plus, he would rather enjoy flying than spend the next half-hour trying to question the stony individual about matters that would most probably be left unanswered. Draco rose higher and together they swooped through the air; though even to Draco who was still in firm denial about his own enjoyment, he was definitely the happier of the two, as shown by Gaara's continuingly blank expression. After all, ninjas spent a lot of their times flying through the air, Gaara would rather not be spending his time working but it made the closest relation he had in the school more cheerful, which in turn might prevent him from trying to subject others to his misery so it seemed like a worthwhile irritant if nothing else.

Eventually, after a lengthy flight, Draco conjured up a basketball sized chunk of wood, named a 'Quaffle', which they passed between them in a miniature game of Quidditch. Predictably, Draco won by no less than one-hundred points because of his much faster vehicle and Gaara's not-so-secret lack of interest. By the time they had finished their game and landed, it was already time for dinner, leading both shinobi and wizard to hasten their gait in fear of one of two things. For Draco, it was the fear of dementors roaming the grounds at night, and for Gaara it was the threat of having to listen to his detestable potions teacher and head of house lecture him on not being a nuisance to good students, like he had had to on many an occasion.

Fortunately, both the late comers were able to sneak into the Great Hall unnoticed when a mysterious explosion of smoke filled the hall; luckily, the two apparent perpetrators, by the name of Fred and George Weasley, who vehemently denied the offence, were promptly caught and reprimanded.

Draco didn't question their good luck; he just sat down quietly along with his silent associate and started eating whilst said associate closed his discreet weapons pouch.

Gaara bitterly observed that there was at least a metre between either of the two outcasts and any of their supposed housemates, and even the closest to them looked a mixture of fear and loathing. All Gaara needed now was an attempt on his life and it would be as good as home.

Days were inevitably tough when you were a cursed demon-container trapped in a foreign world, alone, unable to speak and stuck in a magical school where, in under a month, you had become the local pariah and gossip fodder. As such, the resident tanuki-host was having a pretty hard time throughout his school days, which was not helped by his continuing difficulties controlling his magical outbursts that had destroyed three and a half classrooms, and so, was disallowed from practicing magic in certain lessons like transfiguration. McGonagall had stated that it was difficult enough to ensure the safety of the animal participants when teaching her subject and, frankly, the idea of Gaara pointing his wand at anything living terrified her.

One of the few lessons that Gaara had been spared any major adversity in was Defence Against the Dark Arts, though, the littlest recovering serial killer suspected that this was solely down to the secret mutual friend he shared with his teacher. Still, in the rare practical lessons, no one, including Draco Malfoy, was brave enough or stupid enough to practice with or against the walking wrecking crew. When Gaara had tried to cast the disarming spell on a practice dummy a few days before, he had completely destroyed not only his inanimate opponent but at least five others in the immediate vicinity.

Still, Gaara preferred his embarrassing inability in magic to the soul-destroyingly boring theory lessons where he was forced to listen to the endless lectures that even he, with his ninja-honed focus, struggled to keep his attention directed at the front of the room where it belonged instead of the increasingly interesting tree-shaped cloud outside of the window.

Despite his immense enjoyment of books and of reading, the youngest sand-sibling was no more an academic than he was a ramen enthusiast, which had come to be a problem in the past, in situations like the first part of the Chunin exams; but that was what being a ninja with a floating third-eye was all about.

The surprisingly relaxed student had actually surrendered in the battle against History of Magic. He just couldn't stay awake in the most boring experience he had ever been forced to attend, so he had taken to replacing himself with a sedimentary sand-clone in a sleeping position on his desk whilst he explored more of the enormous castle. Surprisingly, even after several weeks, Draco had yet to notice that the red-head lying beside him was completely hollow and made out of sand. He would replace the sand-clone with himself at the end of the torturous lesson and no one was any the wiser.

The only reason he had been able to avoid any unnecessary adversity from his ignorance and inexperience was because of his steadfast reading around his subjects; that, and the teachers were still a little too intimidated by the scariest Slytherin in recent years to risk aggravating him. Even after Snape had been forced to disallow Gaara's participation in any and all class practical activities, he had yet to give a single detention, as the notion of spending an extra few hours alone with the psychopathic-looking boy was not one he was willing to seriously consider.

In the tanuki-boy's current class, he was attempting to mimic the ' _Stupefy_ ' charm using a pencil instead of his wand, as even Remus Lupin, experienced dueller, Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher and veteran of the Order of the Phoenix in the first wizarding war against He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, was not confident enough in his abilities to try and defend against whatever Gaara's wand would create in place of the student's simple stunning spell.

Once the humiliation was over for the Jinchuriki, Lupin dismissed his class so that they could raise hell for someone else, preferably Snape or Filch. The professor spotted a bright red patch moving at the back of the crowd, in no hurry to leave, accompanied by a platinum-blonde head who looked very pleased with his achievement in his last class, namely rendering one Ronald Weasley unconscious, only to be reawakened by Lupin's own ' _Rennervate_ ' counter-curse soon after. He briskly walked to the exiting teens and asked Gaara to stay behind briefly so they could have a little chat. A private chat, he added when Draco, looking irritated to just be in Lupin's presence, showed no signs of leaving without being prompted.

When the room was empty other than the two silent occupants, Remus offered Gaara a seat before leaning against one of the many desks sat at the side of the room, once Gaara had removed his gourd and sat down.

"Gaara, I've noticed that you've been rather closed off recently; after that incident with the Boggart." Even the aging Marauder knew that wasn't really anything new, but there had definitely been a change in the boy's behaviour, making the recluse even more reserved than before. "Would you like to talk about what happened, about the fear you faced?"

A slow shake of the head dashed that thin sliver of hope for the well-wishing man who had wanted Gaara to open up a little; even if it was just to him. However, the fear inducing teen had no desire to reveal his past or emotions to this man, despite his obviously kind intentions, not yet.

"I'm just worried. We all know so little about you, Gaara, and when you faced your fear like that…" Lupin didn't need to finish as Gaara clearly had no intention of giving anything away for the moment, and badgering him wouldn't help any. "Okay, but if you ever need help, or want to talk to somebody, don't hesitate. I know this is a strange place for you," The werewolf had lowered his voice at this part, not willing for an eavesdropper to hear about their illicit connection, "and being here all alone must be difficult, but Padfoot and I are both here for you. You should probably get going; goodness knows what Mr Malfoy is getting up to in your absence."

Gaara stood, letting the heavy words sink in for him whilst he swung the gourd easily onto his back before he walked towards the door. As his hand rested on the door handle, he inaudibly sighed and reached behind himself and pulled the cork out of place to allow a small tendril of sand to crawl out and spell a few words. Soon after they had been shaped, they were dispersed as the (panda) _raccoon_ -eyed boy left the room, the sand following soon after. It had read: 'She was my mother.'

Lupin, shocked beyond words, dropped the matter for the foreseeable future.

Upon leaving the classroom, the outcast found the halls to be completely empty so, in one of his sombre moods, he decided to enjoy the peace and tranquillity and walk lazily towards the nearest exit so he could relax in the autumn sun for a few hours before either dinner or his homework needed his attention. Lamentably, Gaara stumbled across what appeared to be Draco and a handful of other Slytherin upperclassmen harassing a first-year Gryffindor who looked more terrified than an Akimichi at an intervention. Well…at least Draco was socializing…

The tiny retired executioner stood still for a good few moments, as he weighed up whether he actually cared enough to intervene or if his conscience would hound him for hours for letting the child suffer a pummelling. With a dejected sigh he slumped towards the crowd who were currently playing keep-away with the eleven-year-old's new wand. A few of them looked up in time to see Gaara grab the wand from the air before handing it to the child and letting him run away from the suddenly still group who had parted like the Red Sea at the sight of the do-gooder.

"What in the world do you think you're doing?" The tallest of the Slytherins present demanded, as he watched their terrified prey run around a corner and out of sight.

"Yeah, that was a mud-blood you just helped."

"Draco, I thought you said he was a pureblood!" The boy across from Malfoy shouted accusatorily towards their social better and school underclassman.

"Look, I'm sure he's planning something much wors-" The platinum blonde couldn't finish his practiced bravado as the collar of his shirt was thrust into his wind pipe when the shinobi he was defending dragged him away from the group of his housemates with one hand on the scruff of his robes.

Ignoring Draco's chokes and the Slytherins' startled expressions at his raw physical strength, that was slight compared to his peers back home but still Herculean on this planet, Gaara hauled his roommate onwards through the castle, thankful for the clean floors that were aiding him infinitely with their slippery polished surfaces. As he walked forwards, the occasional resistance coming from Draco's thrashing feet, the Jinchuriki wondered who or what cleaned the floors around the castle, as he was certain the caretaker wouldn't use his mop for anything other than cleaning up vomit and hitting trespassing students. His trivial musings weren't long lived as he decided that he'd walked quite far enough, judging by Draco having gone still all of a sudden. Turning a corner into a darkened and isolated alcove, Gaara performed one more feat of amazing strength for the day, already having tired his arm out sufficiently, as he hefted Draco up to his feet, holding on a little longer than necessary to make sure his acquaintance was fully conscious and not going to fall back down to the ground again.

Thankfully, the heir to the Malfoy fortune was still conscious and was understandably upset because of his maltreatment only moments ago, though his fuming rant fell on death ears as Gaara called sand out of his gourd and started to form a few quick hand-seals, stopping Draco in the middle of his train of thought as he watched the sand rise to a soft and constantly shifting pillar that erected to just under Draco's own height. Before long, the shifting of the sand pillar began to slow as it took the shape of the newest addition to the Hogwarts family. The sand particles all rolled into place and recreated even the most miniscule of details from the red-head who didn't look even close to as amazed as Draco, who couldn't stop staring as the sand-clone started to change colour to match Gaara exactly, detail for detail minus the enormous gourd absent from the copy.

"What in th-"

"It's called a sand clone, Draco."

Draco was struck more speechless than the original Gaara, who was standing to the right of his clone whom had just said the first words anyone from that world had ever heard Gaara say. The newly speechless teen didn't know which he was more startled by: the fact that the mute teen had just spoken to him, albeit through a clone, or that Gaara, who had caused more than a few nightmares around the castle and was thought to be the most terrifying thing to roam the halls since the sixty-foot basilisk from Salazar Slytherin's Chamber of Secrets, had such a soft speaking voice.

"I need to talk to you." The delicate voice returned soon after, though it was in a predictably short and reserved manner, much like Gaara's sand messages which most people around the school had assumed were to accommodate his limited volume of sand.

"But, why didn't you use this before now?" Draco asked, pointing uncomfortably at the clone and looking between the identically blank and yet steely black-rimmed pairs of eyes, not sure which he should address.

"This is a technique for battle, not leisure." Like Gaara in the past, the sand-bunshin didn't blink all that much as it spoke, unnerving the avid listener despite his face's incredulous expression at the childish reason for Gaara's continual and apparently voluntary, silence.

"So, talk…" Draco, although shocked, was still miffed at almost being strangled to death in such a muggle manner and so couldn't help but be a little short with his friend… and his friend's clone.

Gaara wasted no time in mentally commanding his sand-clone to begin telling Draco his story, and about what he had long ago accepted into his heart. He just hoped he could persuade the pureblood to change his ways without having to resort to violence, like he himself had needed.

"I used to be just like you," Gaara-clone said, instantly drawing Draco's attention at the saddened inflection the perfect copy was using. "I was so alone, and filled with hatred for everybody around me… I lived in a place where everyone loathed, and despised me, and thought I was nothing more than a weapon to be used and then tossed away."

Malfoy stood slack-jawed as he listened to the familiar life story whilst the real Gaara stared at the ground, leaving his doppelganger to continue. "I killed people… so many people… and until a few months ago, I had never looked back in regret."

The unsurprising revelation that the, admittedly scary, teenager that he had slept beside for the past few weeks was a sociopathic serial-killer, was just one of the many he had been gifted in the past few seconds; wherein questions he had held had been answered, but just as these answers were given, even more questions were left in their wake. This led Draco to lean forward in anticipation of the next part of the riveting story. And frankly, he had gained a little more respect and maybe even admiration for Gaara after he learnt of his sordid past. He would have thought that Dumbledore, in his supposed glory and splendour, would have stopped such a dangerous being from entering the school.

"Why… why did you kill them?" The Slytherin hadn't even noticed his words leave his mouth, but now that they had, he was desperately curious.

"To prove my existence. I was nothing more than a tool that could be disposed of at any time, so I needed to leave a bloody path of destruction to show that I had lived." There was no nostalgia or pride in Gaara's voice, only remorse as he poured his heart out. He hadn't planned to share so much with anyone in this world, much less Draco Malfoy, whom he had met less than a month ago; but Gaara knew it was a minor sacrifice if he was to save the boy from himself.

"So, why did you stop? You were right; if it proves you are worth something, then it's okay to kill a few idiots." Draco wasn't just defending Gaara now, he was defending himself and his own actions and he didn't even know it.

"Because I met someone who showed me a better path, a way to be stronger. He was just like me, he had grown up feared and despised, but he did not fill his life with that hatred. He worked to protect his precious people, even if he died. In the end, even though I was much stronger, I lost to him… At first I couldn't understand why he kept fighting… I thought I was alone, but even I had precious people. Despite everything that I had done, I had people to rely on."

"But others make you weak. Someone could take them as hostages or they could betray you..."

"Is it better to be alone?"

Draco looked thoroughly confused at this turn in the conversation, having been raised to believe the exact opposite of what he was hearing now, and the most perplexing part was that it was making perfect sense to him.

"Who told you all of this?"

Gaara paused for a moment before answering with a light smile on both sand and real faces, "A loud, blonde idiot."

"Why are you telling me these things?" Draco looked the gift-horse in the mouth and he was genuinely baffled.

"Because it is too painful to watch you suffering like you are right now. You hide behind such an angry and isolated mask and I am afraid… If you live your life behind a mask, then eventually you'll lose who you were beneath it. Like I did."

"Mask? What are you talking about?"

"Do you really agree with what the others say, with what your father tells you?" Gaara's scepticism mirrored Draco's uncertainty, as the former played on what he had gathered about the latter. Once the sand shinobi had gotten over the emotional trauma brought up by his mother's reappearance, he looked into what Draco's father's appearance meant and found some rather disturbing rumours about the man and his xenophobic beliefs, which he had probably thrust upon his son since a young age.

"That's not true! Those mud-bloods are abominations that don't deserve to use magic! They are inferior in every way to us purebloods!"

"Then, why did you have to ask if I was a pureblood? You should have been able to tell from one look."

"That's bec-"

"There is no difference, and I think you know that. An old family isn't what gives you strength. Only after you have protected someone important to you, will you find real strength."

"I don't have a choice; if I don't follow tradition then my father will disown me. I'll have no one else."

"So, instead, you will suffer while doing what you know is wrong."

"The Dark Lord would kill me if I became a blood-traitor, like the Weasleys" Despite the obvious simultaneous confusion and revelations that were whirling around Draco's mind, his loathing of the Weasleys was still able to shine through as clear as day.

"You have to stand up for what you believe in, even if it kills you." Gaara replied, hoping that what he was saying was still getting through to the scared teenager.

As Draco's face morphed into shock, the mute of the pair decided he had said enough for the moment, and that any more would merely overload the platinum-blonde's brain. The taller of the two didn't seem to notice as the sand-clone cracked and fell apart until it was once again a pile of sand on the ground, ready to be called back into the crazy-tanuki-landlord's gourd. Gaara walked away as the sand finished floating back into its holder, praying that the weather was still warm enough to sit outside in.

Draco Malfoy stayed standing in the dark secluded corner of Hogwarts on his own for over an hour after Gaara had left to relax, as his mind worked over the myriad of ideas he had been given not long ago. Eventually, Draco came to the startling and damning conclusion that Gaara, for all of his eccentricities and faults, had been right: Draco didn't want to be so alone and angry all the time, not any more. He had a very difficult time ahead of him now that he was to change his life. With a great sigh, Draco couldn't help but wonder if he wouldn't have been better off ignorant of his own misdeeds… Probably not.

Malfoy slumped off in the direction of his common room to sleep off the oncoming headache that was making itself known on the horizon of his mind.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Gaara had been a very busy little bee in the past week. The off-worlder's chat with Draco had yielded the unexpected benefit of freeing his time enormously, opening up the possibility of some extracurricular research. Due to the secretive nature of Gaara's true origins, he had been unable to look into a solution to his predicament whilst he was still being followed closely by Draco, whom he'd had trouble shaking off before his talk. Recently, though, Draco had begun to change in many ways; mainly his associating with different people. No longer did he sit exclusively with the blood purists and spiteful Slytherins during meals, now Draco had taken to sitting by the moderates and rare muggle-born Slytherins. However, this change in seating was hardly volitional as, even with Draco's miraculous change in persona, eliminating his deep-seated hatred towards all but the nobles and purebloods, he still didn't particularly like the mud-bloods and blood traitors who were either ignorant of wizarding ways or were as dirt-poor as the Weasley family, and as uneducated to boot. The Malfoy heir would have been content to spend his time with his old 'friends', even if he didn't support their extreme views or particularly like their personalities anymore, but they didn't feel quite the same way as him evidently, shown by their open disgust at his apparent treachery and their shunning of him.

These hardships had produced a positive result, to Gaara's delight, as Draco was now happy to socialize with other houses; other houses meaning Ravenclaw, as the Hufflepuffs were still wimps and idiots in the newly reformed antagonist's eyes and the less said about the Gryffindors the better.

With Draco open to new people, not all of his time was spent with Gaara; though, he still spent the majority of his free time around his roommate, to said roommate's chagrin, as he had apparently struck further accord with the silent boy since he had stopped devoting his energies to hating others. It wasn't that Gaara really disliked Draco, as he wasn't one to tolerate fools, but he had desperately needed to get some time alone. With the platinum-blonde otherwise occupied for the moment, there had been nothing to stop the red-head from hiding-out in the library for the last five hours on the rainy Saturday afternoon to study.

Then again, after five hours, the bookworm had found absolutely nothing on his chosen subject. He had scoured both the student and rumoured restricted sections and could not locate a single volume regarding dimensional magic or any mention of his home world. There wasn't even any reliable information about shinobi, just a similar culture in another country on this planet that barely resembled his home and was without jutsu. The only thing Gaara had been able to deduce firmly was that he was not on the same planet anymore. The Suna-nin had one hunch, and that was that he was in a parallel universe. He had noticed, almost immediately after he learned that he wasn't in his own world, that the people spoke the same language and were, for the most part, human. It would have been a little bit too coincidental if the two worlds had been so similar yet unrelated. Unfortunately, that didn't help the littlest-sand shinobi as he didn't know one space-time jutsu and hadn't signed a contract with a summon animal.

Slamming his fists down on the desk piled high with books, Gaara let out a suppressed scream of frustration, ignoring the stacks of hardbacks that fell to the floor in his fury. The ninja had known that it would take more than one day to remedy his situation, but he had expected to find something, anything on the subject that could lead him elsewhere, but it was as if wizards didn't know how to perform space-time techniques. The closest the stranded boy could find was apparition, but that was severely limited in distance and couldn't go anywhere but Earth.

Even if it took asking Dumbledore for help, Gaara would get home. But he wasn't quite so forlorn yet, as he still had a few more places to search, and he could always enlist the help of Moony and Padfoot, as long as he could stand being called by his loathed nickname for a few hours.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

A little known fact is that convicted criminals on the run, hiding out in abandoned shacks, don't have very much to do with their time; granted, the criminals can stare out of the window or break old furniture or, if they are lucky enough to be an unregistered animagus, go out on runs through the deserted and freezing-cold woods. But, other than that, criminals on the run have very long and unfulfilling days, unless they are fortunate and have a friend willing to send owls to them with current news and stories about how their friends are doing in school.

Sirius waited for his best friend's messages like a drowning man waited for his next breath, and when they did come, he could barely keep from kissing the delivery owl on the break. In fact, there had been nasty incident a few weeks before that ended with a large cut on his lips and a decidedly put-out owl.

When the latest owl came for the dog-turned-man, he was ecstatic as he hadn't heard from Remus in over a week, which, admittedly, wasn't that long, but was still long enough for him to be going stir crazy from boredom. He tore the letter from the scorned owl's clutches without so much as a thank you, sorry or even a passing glance, before he sat down on one of the few chairs left in the house that could still withstand him sitting on it. Sirius ripped open the wax seal on the parchment and began to read one of the only consolations left for the lonely man.

' _Padfoot,_

_Things have been relatively quiet here since I last owled you, but I figured you would be going insane out there by yourself. Typical; you break out of a prison where most of the inmates lose there minds, and you go mad through boredom._

_Prongs Jr. has been doing well in school, and I think he might be one of my best students in the practical defence classes. He mastered the stupefy spell in one lesson. It was like watching Prongs again! I just wish his theory was as good. Maybe he could get some help from one of his friends. He's more like you in that respect._

_Sadly, he seems to be down as of late. I don't know what is upsetting him, but I have tried talking to him. He didn't want to talk about it. That reminds me; I talked to Lily like you suggested. He was as shielded as always, but I did find out what his Boggart was about. I will tell you in person next time I'm able to get to you, which should probably be some time after next week. I'll probably pop in after the full moon._

_On the upside, Lily seems to have had a positive effect on his friend, the one I told you about last time. The boy doesn't even seem to be going out of his way to attack Prong Jr. anymore. It's a miracle._

_I think I'm rambling so I'll finish this letter now and let you get back to your busy day._

_Your old friend,_

_Moony_

_P.S. I found Wormtail. He's been staying in the Gryffindor dorm rooms during the day lately. I will get him soon and then we can finish it._ '

This latest communication put Sirius into a mixture of simultaneous ease and concern as he joyfully reread the part about Harry being just like his father, before looking at the disconcerting part about Lily's Boggart, considering the fate of the transformed Boggart. Not only that, Harry's depression really worried Sirius as he was the boy's godfather and should have been the one to talk to him about his troubles instead of hiding in a dilapidated shack whilst the world thought he was trying to kill the boy.

At least there was some good news in there, other than Harry's magical aptitude, that being Gaara fighting for the light. That he had managed to turn one of the staunchest and most bigoted families' heirs against the pureblood belief structure was simply amazing. Sirius had, truthfully, been very upset when he heard that his new friend had been sorted into the snake house, but now he was ready to see a whole new upside to this situation, namely Gaara changing even more minds against the evils that lead to so many wars. He'd have to congratulate Lily, next time he saw him. And whilst he was there, he would have to give the tiny ninja a few lessons in spell casting if Lupin's letters regarding the boy's dangerous incompetence and ineptitude in magic were to be believed.

As the hour grew late, the owl having arrived deep into the night to avoid any questions about who the reclusive and lonesome professor was mailing, Sirius pored over the last note in the relatively short message, regarding his dear old friend, Pettigrew. Oh, how Sirius wanted to tear that rat limb from limb. The rage had been building constantly towards the traitor since his escape from Azkaban months ago, and it was getting to the point where he wasn't sure he could wait any longer to kill him. If Lupin didn't act soon, he would.

Sirius folded up the latest letter and hid it under one of the many loose floorboards, which held all of the precious snippets of information from his beloved Hogwarts. The scapegoat uneasily fell into a terrible and troubled sleep, haunted by the demons of his twelve year stay in hell, the only reprieve coming from the pleasant memories of his friends and family.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Draco tried valiantly to hold back a snicker as he watched Gaara squirm virtually imperceptibly in their current lesson, his roommate apparently uncomfortable surrounded by the veritable rainforest of vegetation that comprised the walls of the green-houses that held the third-years' Herbology classes. Professor Sprout seemed oblivious to Gaara's nervous shifting as he tried desperately not to touch any of the hundreds of plants that inundated him whilst still listening to the teacher's speech about Devil's Snare, the dangers presented by the plant and its uses in places like dungeons to protect valuables. Gaara did not, by any stretch of the imagination, have a universal fear of plants unlike his magical-aviophobia. Being a ninja, the desert-dweller spent a lot of his time jumping through trees when in another country, and was actually quite partial to his cactus garden at home, but when you grow up with an older brother who creates most of his poisons from rare and exotic flowers, you begin to distrust strange looking plants.

Gaara really hoped that someone was looking after his cactus orchard. Then again, it wasn't like it needed to be watered for a good few months.

In the mean-time, the red-head was trying to remember if the plant he was dangerously close to leaning on was of any relation to the scary purple plant in Kankuro's bedroom that he had been told never to touch. Other than Gaara's wariness, the lesson was largely uneventful. One of his patented Death Glares© soon shut Draco up.

The head of Hufflepuff house was happy to report in the staffroom that evening that her all-glass classroom had been left completely undamaged once more. As time went on, it became apparent to Professor Vector, the Arithmancy teacher and chief bookie of the Gaara-Classroom-Demolition pool, that her little prize horse was losing his taste for destruction. Minerva had to comfort her crying colleague after the revelation that she would be losing the hundreds of galleons she had been collecting on top of her wages.

Snape still didn't trust the little monster with his classroom, though.

One teacher, who'd had the luxury not to work in a confined space that could potentially be destroyed by the accident-prone transfer student, was Rubeus Hagrid. Despite the near-death experience of one of his third-year students, the threat of a law-suit from the boy's friend's father and his complete lack of academic expertise, the man continued to try and share his vast knowledge pertaining to magical creatures in the only way he knew how. That way being, showing the animals to the students; though, he had stopped forcing them into riding the beasts since his first accident.

During the teacher's latest escapades, detailing the behavioural differences of Hippogriffs and Pegasus's, Gaara stood far at the back of the congregation with the strongest conviction not to interact nor ride any of the monsters he was being shown. Gaara was NOT scared of the Hippogriff strutting around the clearing, he was just being cautious, respecting his foe's space.

Draco was eating possibly the loudest apple ever grown with great relish whilst he listened half-heartedly to the incompetent oaf's lecture that was soon drowned out by a loud, angry, whinny followed by, what the scared racoon-boy could only describe as, an indignant squawk. Hagrid, for all of his years of experience with the thousands of magical creatures that inhabit the Forbidden Forrest, hadn't considered that he had never seen a Hippogriff socialize with a Pegasus in the wild, and now they were fighting.

Inching further away from the rampaging beasts, Gaara decided, as did most of the class that the lesson was probably over for today. The Slytherin outcasts walked away from the open-air classroom in favour of a game of Wizard's Chess which was suspiciously like Shogi, for which Gaara had not lost a single match against Malfoy due to his tactical skills. He was raised as a demonic war machine; it was only natural that he could trump a teenager in simulated battlefield strategy.

After ten minutes of walking through the woods, it occurred to Draco that he didn't remember walking this way to get to the lesson earlier that afternoon. In fact, now that he paid attention to his surroundings, he didn't really recognise anything around him. Turning to his walking companion, Malfoy aired his concerns about their current location to which Gaara gestured noncommittally that he too, did not know where they were or, more importantly, where they were going. As uninterested as the trained killer seemed to be, his sheltered friend was certainly starting to panic, further exacerbated by Gaara's aloofness.

They turned around after Draco insisted that he'd seen some of the creatures that came out after dark in the forest and that they weren't the kinds of things he wanted to meet again in a hurry. Another five minutes of walking and they were thoroughly lost.

The calmer of the pair, was so because, for one, he knew he could fight off almost any obstacle they came across, and two, because he had walked through the very same forest not so long ago and he had been without protection and heavily injured. The biggest danger Draco was in was annoying his walking partner too much and risking being knocked out. Gaara was considering whether it would be easier to just carry a quietly sleeping Draco instead of listening to his paranoid whining for the next few hours whilst he established where they were, when an idea came to him. The experienced assassin activated his _Third Eye_ technique, making the panicking Malfoy jump and stare at the single strangest thing he'd seen his roommate do…today. The strange creation floated before its owner, as he covered his own eye and connected with the artificial one.

Whilst Draco silently debated whether this technique was creepier than the sand clone or not, Gaara raised the orb high above the canopy to get an eagle-eye view of the area. To the ninja's amusement, not only did he see Hogwarts far in the distance, he saw three oblivious teenagers hidden about a hundred feet away from him, behind a bush. The three were whispering excitedly about something, and kept glancing suspiciously towards Draco and him. It was still only the middle of the day so Gaara, in one of his more mischievous moods, decided to continue his walk for the rest of the day.

Gaara pointed in an arbitrary direction, reassuring the nervous Draco as they began their day-long trek through the woods. He deactivated his extra eye when he was sure the Golden Trio, who had followed the two conspicuous Slytherins, were still on his trail.

Six hours later, Draco was not in a good mood, nor were the three Gryffindor pursuers who had given up the pretence of secretly following the Slytherins four hours ago. The only person on the hike who wasn't glaring at anyone was the person who was being glared at. The Suna-nin wasn't even close to tired by the time they reached the edge of the Forbidden Forrest, and had inadvertently learnt a particularly useful fact for the up-and-coming full moon.

Shukaku, even with all of his power as a tailed-demon, was an idiot and couldn't use any techniques more complicated than a super-enhanced belch. If the Ichibi were to take control in a week's time, then Gaara needed somewhere where the sand monster couldn't get to the students, and since the demon would only be able to use Gaara's body and not his own gigantic one, the perfect place had been right outside of his window the whole time. The Forbidden Forrest would trap the tiny-tanuki demon until the morning when Gaara could take control and use his _Third Eye_ to leave. It would simply mean that he would have to leave most of his sand in the dormitory to avoid his inner demon from creating a miniature body to move faster. Gaara didn't want to take any chances and leave a defenceless population centre open to slaughter.

The four real wizards were sure that their guide had led them in circles all day on purpose, especially when the boy had let slip a thin sliver of a smile. Of course, the Slytherin and Gryffindors had never conferred or discussed this theory because, no matter what strenuous hardships they were put through together, they still hated each other passionately. Around two hours back, Hermione had tried to start up a conversation including their Slytherin classmates, which was completely ignored by Gaara who was still leading them around the Forbidden Forest with no intention change directions for another hour or so, and Draco listlessly indulged in the chatter, which surprised the conversation's initiator and her two close friends.

As they all walked into the Great Hall, intending to catch dinner as it started, they hoped to subtly slip into their seats without drawing any unnecessary attention to themselves. The usual hubbub and clattering present in the Great Hall came to an immediate halt when the doors revealed the absentee Harry Potter and his four classmates. The teachers, who had all been busy deliberating over their missing students and their unascertained fates, had been worried out of their minds for the past few hours when Hagrid arrived back at the castle minus five students. Well, most of the teachers had been concerned; Snape had suggested, with no small measure of gaiety in his voice, that they might have run afoul of some of the Dementors roaming the grounds, or been eaten by one of the Forest's various carnivorous inhabitants, or encountered a runaway mass murderer. Though, Severus was well aware that those sorts of horrific fates were unlikely because of Gaara's presence, which had proven to be lethal when needs be. Still, whilst it would have been lamentable to lose Mr Malfoy, the deaths of the other four thorns in his side would have been a welcome relief.

So, when the quintet of wanderers returned to the pandemonium of Hogwarts, they had not expected to be welcomed so loudly by the Headmaster of all people, and certainly not so angrily.

Shouting through the roar of inquisitive students, Dumbledore commanded with his prevailing veneration, "Quiet! Misters Gaara, Malfoy, Potter, Weasley and Miss Granger, come with me!" He left no room for objection or argument as he swept past his teaching staff and out of the back exit of the hall. He didn't slow down on his way to his office, his rare anger showing through in perfect form as he sped through the empty halls of the school. Once the five had taken the long walk down the centre aisle, trying in vain to avoid as many stares and questioning glances as possible, they too left the hall after their principle.

Gaara shivered as he felt the accusatory and jealous stares of his fan-club on his back when he left the enormous chamber.

The corridor was eerie for the group, as they followed to where they assumed the Professor had left to in a hurry. None of them talked, not for Ron's lack of trying, he had made numerous attempts to start up a light-hearted conversation with his two close friends and even once with Gaara, but due to the tense nature of this latest walk and one student's mute nature, all were shot down quickly. The stone gargoyle that usually guarded Dumbledore's office was already gone, leaving the chilling steps behind for the troublesome students to climb. The only person not afraid of what they might find waiting for them at the top of the stairs was, of course, Gaara who had recently been debating whether or not it was worth him staying in the school for the rest of the year when he couldn't even find any useful information. He had decided to put off the decision for a little while, until he was absolutely certain there was nothing he could learn. And then there was always the possibility he might never find a way home, and if that was the case then he would need to associate with the wizarding world. He was fairly certain that he would stand out like a sore thumb in the muggle world… more so than in the wizarding one.

Up the winding spiral staircase the five trudged until they stood outside of the thick wooden door that the Headmaster must have shut after himself for dramatic effect.

"Come in." They heard the aging wizard's voice through the door, which sounded more exasperated than angry by this point.

Albus had been the most scared of all of the teachers because he knew precisely how much danger Harry and his friends had been in. In the Forbidden Forest, there was not only the potential threat of Sirius Black, but also the violent animals and the dementors that could easily have done away with them, and then there was Draco Malfoy who could very well have attacked the Gryffindors out of spite, and finally there was Gaara. That had been the real reason he had had the teachers out searching for three long hours along with many of the older students who had brooms; not the acromantulas, dragons and serial killers, no, Dumbledore had been frantically searching for them because he had been sure that Gaara had been the cause of their disappearance. He was right, but Gaara had no intention of killing his classmates, though he had briefly considered maiming Ron Weasley because of his irritating questions and never-ending forgetfulness in regards to the Sunagakure resident's muted condition. But Albus need never know that.

He watched the five guilty looking teenagers file into his office, even Gaara looked a little remorseful, but that might have been because he had been caught pulling a childish prank and was embarrassed by his similarity to a certain fox-faced shinobi back home. Nevertheless, the Chief Mugwump was not going to go easy on them because they looked sorry, he had to impress the severity of the risk they took today. Plus, sometimes he liked to play the 'bad cop', it was kind of fun.

"Sit down, please." The voice was grave and scared four of them so much that they didn't even question the fact that there weren't any chairs for them to use. Hermione was about to sit down on the ground when five chairs appeared, as if by magic. They all took their seats as instructed, Gaara noticing and appreciating that his chair was in fact a stool. He gave a nod to Dumbledore in gratitude for the man's consideration of his unique back-wear.

"Professor, we can explain-" Hermione started in a panic, but was cut of by the headmaster's raised hand.

"Miss Granger, I do not care for excuses, so do not waste my time by telling them." The glare directed over the top of half-moon spectacles was chilling the five it was directed at. As Gaara listened to the tense conversation that was slowly progressing, he wondered why he had been invited to attend when it was no secret that he could participate no more than the colourful bird in the corner could. At that thought, he began to watch the bird as it leisurely pruned itself on its perch. He didn't know how much time had elapsed since he had turned his gaze to the fascinating red bird, but his attention quickly snapped back to the humans in the room when they decided to canvas his opinion.

"Is that true, Gaara?" Dumbledore looked more thoughtful now, but still concerned which led Gaara to nod slowly but surely. Time to see if luck was on his side today.

"Well, I'm glad we were able to clear that mess up. But, in future, stay with your class when you return from Professor Hagrid's class. Now, if you hurry, I'm sure you can catch the end of dinner."

As they began to quickly move towards the door, all saying sorry and goodbye except for Gaara who gave another nod, Albus spoke up once again, "Harry, might I have a word with you in private. The rest of you should just go ahead, he won't be long."

Without any further ado, Gaara moved onwards quickly. He was hungry, bored and battling a major headache caused by a hungry and bored demon inside of him. The other three followed him, though the two from the house of gold and red were decidedly hesitant in their pace as they were leaving Harry to whatever the Headmaster had left to say after the, admittedly light, chewing-out.

They instantly divided into their different houses when they entered the Great Hall, once again earning the entire student body's attention. They all sat down in their regular seats, which for the Slytherins meant at the end of the table with the rest of the outcasts. Fortunately for the eating snakes, their house wasn't nearly as outright nosy as the Gryffindors who wouldn't let their returning housemates finish a bite without answering all of their questions.

The night didn't quiet down for any of them after that, as, when Harry returned, the questioning intensified for the Gryffindor so much that the Slytherin table could hear the noisy rabble loud and clear, leading Gaara to go to bed early to sleep off the worst of the headache that Shukaku was causing. The Tanuki-host was sure that it was related to the oncoming full moon, he just hoped his countermeasures would work.

When the red-head left the table, the previously scared Slytherins who didn't hate Draco, gained the courage to start asking him questions as well, causing him to move to the Slytherins who did hate him now. They weren't so much scornful as business like in their questioning of their peer, waiting to hear his reasons for cavorting with the worst of the 'Gryffindorks'. After some quick pomposity, in which he detailed the trick Gaara played on them to mess with the Golden Trio, leaving out his involvement entirely, he went on to describe how annoying they were and how much he hated them. The other Slytherins, who were quick to allow him back into their ranks, did not notice that during the lengthy list of faults he outlined regarding the three lions, he didn't mention blood purity or blood loyalty.

They did ask about Gaara, though, to which Draco said he was still a complete mystery. As far as Draco was concerned, he hadn't lied once.

The only person who had left the dining hall when the five returned, other than the teenagers in trouble, was Remus who needed to urgently send an owl to his good friend. Earlier, when the children had gone missing, Lupin had sent Sirius a note asking him to go out as Padfoot and search the forest for them. It was against his better judgement, but the thought of those five getting hurt or worse, spurred him into irrational action. Now that they had arrived back safe and sound, he needed to tell Sirius to get back to the safety of the shack lest he fall prey to one of the horrors of the woods.

Unfortunately, by the time the owl had arrived at the presumed location of Sirius, he was long gone; searching for his godson and his friend along with their friends. Magical owls can find almost anyone in the world if the address they are sent to is incorrect, but when an owl has a grudge against a person for, in this case, kissing the bird, said bird might just drop the letter there and leave it for the person to find whenever they arrive back. Even if that time is early the next morning, after having stayed out all night searching for the already found students.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

September thirtieth, the night of the full moon.

The day was difficult; an understatement as far as Gaara was concerned as he laboured through the day's classes whilst struggling not to summon some kind of sand weapon to slaughter the children around him. His fighting against Shukaku's influence didn't go unnoticed by his companion whose, although noble, ultimately useless help was appreciated greatly by the suffering Jinchuriki who elected to skip his final class of the day as he wasn't sure if he could stop himself from crushing the life from Snape.

Malfoy had been so concerned over his roommate's worsening headaches over the last few days that he had gone to Madam Pomfrey under the guise of suffering the headaches himself with the notion that he could simply take the potions to Gaara so that the boy could get some sleep, but Draco hadn't counted on her insistence that he drink it right there and then. He'd dropped into a deep sleep for the next six hours before awakening with an almost euphoric feeling like he'd gotten the best night's sleep in his life. He considered telling his relapsed-insomniac friend to go the infirmary but, by the way he was trying to hide his problem and pretend that everything was okay, Draco guessed any such advice would be quite offensive.

The teenage noble didn't know what was causing Gaara's ailment, so he resolved to help in any other way he could. That involved covering for him when he skipped classes, threatening to curse the people in the next room to theirs so that Gaara had a better chance at sleep or just helping with his homework.

But now, as Gaara prepared for the night ahead, he hid all of his weapons and valuables, including his hitai-ate which he stowed under his pillow. It wasn't really the most secure place he could have hid it in, but its worth was only sentimental. He also dropped the gourd next to his bed, unconcerned about it for the moment, only taking the care to extract enough sand to form a third eye when he needed before re-corking it. He briefly considered writing Draco a note to explain his absence during the night, but was saved the trouble when the boy walked through the door.

"Gaara; I need to talk-" He didn't finish his sentence as a quick chop to the back of his neck rendered him unconscious, courtesy of the person he had been concerned about. Dumping his friend onto his bed, Gaara did feel a little remorse for being so forceful with the civilian, but knew the longer he stayed, the more dangerous things/he was going to get. Besides, this way he wouldn't have to explain why he was sneaking out of the school in the evening before a full moon.

He walked out of his room and then out of the Slytherin common room, thankful that it wasn't late enough for him to run into many people with problematic questions. He managed, by some miracle, to escape the castle without being seen by one person. Gaara didn't consider Filch as a person, and anyway, the ratty old man wasn't going to tell anyone he saw the scary little kid leave the castle when there were still so many left behind. As far as Argus was concerned, one down, countless more to go.

One factor, Gaara hadn't considered when he made his plan of action, was that whilst the forest was completely clear of dementors during the day; during the night was a completely different matter. The black-cloaked monstrosities were already beginning to swoop in and out of the trees as Gaara set off on his run through the woods. He had no doubt that when Shukaku took over his body that night, the demon would have little difficulty dealing with them, but whilst Gaara was still in control he was weakened without his sand and weapons. As he continued his run, he noticed the wraiths were drawn towards him and soon began to follow and catch up with him. Taking out the small measure of sand that he had brought with him, he formed it into a rudimentary kunai shape and shot it at the dementors. It flew right through them like the real knives had done before, until he struck one in the head whereupon it met resistance. Commanding the free-flying weapon to aim for the heads of the pursuing creatures was simple enough and it seemed to damage, and in some cases kill, them. When he'd killed five or so, they began to withdraw for the moment until night had fallen and they could return in greater numbers.

As the time stood, Gaara figured he had at least two more hours until sunset would arrive and the full moon would be unveiled. The demon-beast's screams were literally echoing in his head as he kept on sprinting desperately away from the children who would, no doubt, be ripped to shreds until Gaara himself was either killed or captured and then killed.

When the tired and pained teenage weapon finally came to a stop in a densely planted area, he knelt down and waited. He could see through the think blanket of leaves above him that the sun was just pushing past the horizon. Already the familiar feeling of the mental seals on Shukaku weakening sprang to the forefront of his mind but then it was something different. As the last glimmers of solar light burst across the red-head's vision, he could feel a change occurring, but not as it had during the last lunar cycle or ever before.

Collapsing to the floor, Gaara's last coherent thoughts were of fear and uncertainty at this new sensation that was so foreign to him. The seals on Shukaku weren't dissolving, but rather changing and transforming into something unrecognisable. But this unexpected change did not stop Gaara from feeling a change going through him as he lost consciousness, only to wake up an hour or so later.

Things were not right…

To be continued.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

Omake: 

You could call Gaara a whole host of things, many of which are unsavoury, but one label that had never been affixed to the Jinchuriki of the sand was 'paranoid'. So, when the sand user, sat in an isolated corner of the school's library to study the various magical texts he had collected, began to feel a chill go down his spine like he was being watched, he could not help but fell worried. The demon-host looked around himself, trying to ascertain who was watching him read, but every time he looked one way or the other, he would get another feeling of being watched from another direction.

Over the next thirty minutes, Gaara performed the _Suna Shunshin Jutsu_ four times to escape whatever elite tracking unit was following him and eventually he hid in the restricted section to avoid whoever was following him. He stayed hidden in there for another hour when he saw what had been on his tail.

The group of over twenty fangirls, who were all sporting their poorly drawn-on racoon eyes, had their wands out and ready. The group of crazy females had decided to capture their idol and confess their undying (delusional) love to him until he reciprocated that love. Gaara had a very different plan for his day, and it didn't include being abducted by a group of deranged girls.

He stealthily opened the door that separated the restricted and everyday sections of the library, and snuck past the rabid fangirls until he was at the exit of the library. Unfortunately, as he was just moving past the librarian's desk, he heard the terrifying call of "There he is!"

Jumping back to his feet, having crawled along the floor to escape capture, he picked up the nearest stack of books to him and began throwing them at the annoying women. He hit a few on the head, not feeling the slightest guilt for attacking the crazed fans, but before he could knock even a quarter out, they started to fire off stunning and freezing spells at him and the books he was throwing. The great 1993 Battle of the Library, as it came to be known, lasted all too briefly as Gaara ran out of books and was forced to flee. The fan club regrouped and followed after him, intent on capturing the object of their affections.

Similar to Gaara, Draco Malfoy had also been given many unkind names over the years, but one name he was rarely given was 'unlucky'; the sort of bad fortune, which would lead to one being in the completely wrong place and wrong time. For instance, in the path of your sociopath roommate as he is being chased by almost twenty, mad girls who would do just about anything to get to him. By the end of that day, Draco would be know as the unluckiest person it Hogwarts for some time to come, after he had been literally thrown by his good friend into the path of the mob of crazy girls.

That day, Gaara escaped, but Draco didn't. He was stunned and taken back to the headquarters of the Gaara Fan club where he was interrogated for several hours about his treacherous friend.

That night, during dinner, Albus wasn't sure who was angrier; the student who had been kidnapped by the unofficial club that had sprung up at the beginning of the term that seemed to have developed an unhealthy obsession with the new transfer student, because he had been tossed to them by said transfer student; or the head librarian who had returned from her lunch break to find her beloved book repository in ruins. Dumbledore had had to comfort both a traumatised Slytherin and a crying Madam Pince for well over an hour. By the time they each had left his office, they had overcome their sadness and, in Draco's case, disturbance, and had moved onto anger. They were out for blood.

Dumbledore had also had to set up an informal restraining order against the Gaara fan club. It was for everybody's protection.


	5. A New Problem

‘My head hurts...’

 

Oh dear gods, his head hurt, like it had been cracked open and sewn back up a hundred times by the snake Sannin for fun. And his legs hurt too…

 

These insightful musings were some of the first thoughts at the surface of Gaara’s otherwise blank mind when he regained consciousness on the cold, hard forest floor. The demon-jailor took a few moments to clear his head of the useless self-assessing thoughts he’d been fixating on in his stupor, so that he could take stock of where he was and how he had gotten there. It didn’t take at all long for Gaara to recall his evening jog run in the woods followed by the disturbing sensation he’d experienced shortly before passing out rather unexpectedly. Gaara looked around the densely vegetated area he was now standing in, but what he saw didn’t quite match up with the memory he had of the area from when he had arrived there only an hour ago, or so he guessed judging by the darkness of the sky and the position of the bright full-moon.

 

The area wasn’t completely different; in fact, it looked perfectly familiar, just… wrong. The still groggy teenager spent a few more moments processing what he was seeing and then it all clicked, like the cocking of a pump-action shotgun; and the realisation that followed was just as pleasant as what one might expect to follow after hearing the distinctive cocking of said gun. The surroundings he found himself in were indeed exactly the same in appearance; just as they were when he had fallen asleep earlier that evening, but now that he looked closely, really closely, he saw that they were at least twice as big as they had been. As astute as Gaara was during the majority of his exploits, it took even longer for him to realise that it wasn’t that the woods had grown through some genjutsu or through use of the Mokuton bloodline, both of which existing only in his world and the latter being extinct as far as he knew; no, the fact was that the trees and bushes around him hadn’t grown bigger but rather he’d shrunk, to about half his original size.

 

‘Oh...great…’

 

Gaara had never been a tall child and even into his teenage years he’d retained his diminutive stature, which his sister had often argued was as a result of his lack of sleep when Kankuro would tease the Jinchūriki about his size; of course, his older brother wasn’t stupid or suicidal enough to actually make any disparaging remarks about Gaara to his face as the red-head still had anger control issues from time to time. However, now that Gaara was effectively half his old height, it gave him a whole new appreciation for his previously _relatively_ short body when opposed to this new miniature one.

 

Now, there was just one immediately pressing mystery left for him to solve: ‘What’s that, moving behind my head?’

 

Turning around, Gaara didn’t see anything other than the obnoxiously tall bushes that he’d expected to find; but then, there it was again, the unknown fur-covered creature brushing against the back of his head softly, flattening the hair on the nape of his neck. Whipping around again and again produced nothing more than a dizzy mini-Gaara and no sign of whatever foolish animal was playing tricks on him. Deciding to cut this vexatious game short, lest he trip on the circus tent he was wearing, Gaara dug his hand into his now oversized clothes, which were so baggy on him he had trouble routing through the folds, before he produced a handful of sand without so much as looking down at it. He flexed his usual control over the sand and he waited for it to rise into his view so he could restrain (read: attack) the nuisance that was bothering him during what was already a difficult time; but the creature’s discovery, unbeknownst to Gaara, was going to lead to even more tribulation on his part.

 

It took Gaara no longer than a second to realise that the sand he had commanded had failed to rise as instructed or even stir, except for the small amounts trickling between his fingers and falling to the forest floor. When Gaara looked down to diagnose the origin of the problem, he was hit by two revelations: the first of which was an unwelcome discovery that filled him with dread, and the second was one of self-disparagement at not having noticed the first one sooner.

 

As the shinobi had looked down at his hands, he had realised, with dire consternation, what was brushing the back of his neck; the very same thing that gave a responsive twitch as he concentrated on its movements. It became all too clear as he stared down at the fuzzy paws, complete with digital pads, where his hands _should_ have been. He turned them over to look at the other side of the sandy coloured fur that covered the appendages that apparently belonged to him. Out of desperation more than logic, he brought his paws up to his fluffy chest and tried to dispel the horrible genjutsu someone had used on him, only to find that he wasn’t in any genjutsu nor was he still asleep, as the highly acclaimed ninja test of pinching oneself proved, a task made all the more difficult because of the small size and almost rounded shape of the digits he was using. The equally fluffy, if not more so, tail that had been brushing against the back of his head, came into view when he honed-in on the tail’s sensations. It was as he feared; he’d turned into a mini-furry-Shukaku. The enormous racoon tail that was similarly sand coloured and featured the characteristic blue swirls all over it just about proved that it was the same as the accursed demon inside of him. Funnily enough, he couldn’t hear the demon’s ranting and raving at the moment, but he had bigger problems than the unusual silence of his normally rambunctious tenant, namely his size and loss of sand control, equating to defencelessness for the shinobi who had once bragged of having the ultimate defence.

 

Ever the pragmatist, to the extent that he could adapt seamlessly to a new world in moments, Gaara didn’t dwell on what he desperately hoped was a temporary change as he now had to focus on how he, as a small and fluffy tanuki-human with no chakra control or special powers, was going to survive the entire night in the infamously dangerous and aptly named Forbidden Forest. It appeared that he wasn’t a full-fledged tanuki; thankfully, when he considered certain tanuki body-parts that would’ve made running a trifle more difficult. Also, he thanked whatever gods may be that he didn’t have to cope without opposable thumbs during this troublesome ordeal, no matter how small the thumbs he had were. Apart from his height, stubby fingered paws and tail that was easily a foot taller than him on its own, Gaara appeared to have a fairly humanoid body, with the added bonus of surprisingly warm sand-coloured fur with the same blue markings as those on his tail, though sparser it seemed as he looked over his new body

 

And people said Gaara was a pessimist; at least he was warm…

 

Gaara replaced the sand in his pocket, ready for the morning when he would transform back if he had any good luck going for him at all. After his lifeline was secure, he shed all of his oversized clothes completely, as they would do nothing but hinder his movement and identify him as the vulnerable Hogwarts student he currently was; besides, he _was_ covered in fur to keep him warm so he didn’t see the harm in leaving his folded clothes in the hollowed-out base of a nearby tree for the time being. With a few scratches around said tree as well as surrounding trees to guide him back to his garments when the sun was to rise, courtesy of his newly discovered and auspiciously sharp claws, Gaara didn’t have to worry about his clothes being lost when the time came.

 

One feature that Gaara found to be even more irksome than his further diminished procerity, were his newly discovered digitigrade legs that made him feel like he was walking on his tiptoes constantly. He had trouble taking more than a few steps without teetering and falling when his concentration and balance wavered in the slightest. Like the canid he had transformed into, Gaara’s new back legs now had shorter thighs and calves and longer feet, meaning he now had to perform a sort of shuffle to walk forwards rather than actual stepping. As Gaara had dropped off his clothes, he resolved to find out how to walk around properly with his incommodiously short digitigrade legs.

 

The final alteration that he noticed was that he could make some unintelligible sounds out of his previously heavily damaged throat. It seemed that this form completely regenerated his vocal cords, unfortunately it also appeared that he could not speak any coherent human words without sounding like a dog performing a trick, as this voice box wasn’t built to speak, merely growl, whine and create any number of other animalistic sounds. Still, it was nice to be able to make himself heard again, even if it was nonsense and incoherent guttural noises and the occasional angry gnarl of frustration when he fell over again and again.

 

Walking wasn’t at all difficult once he’d gotten used to ambling around on his new legs; running, on the other hand, was arduous if not impossible whilst carrying the considerable weight of his tail with him. The weight didn’t make any sense to Gaara, as, when he had squeezed the soft extremity, he’d discovered that it was almost all fur, only a thin flesh and bone tail in the centre of the appendage that, including fuzz, was wider than his torso, at the tip. No matter how soft the thing felt when Gaara squeezed it to his chest with both arms, when it swayed to and fro behind him and hit a bush or tree sapling, the thing it hit was blown back as if it had been impacted with a large stone club. It was some measure of a consolation that he at least had a weapon of sorts with him, even if it was a large fluffy bat attached to his backside. Still, he didn’t like his chances in a fight with only his teeny tiny claws, however sharp they might be, so the club was a reassurance.

 

\-----------------------------

 

Rubeus Hagrid was a caring man who tried in earnest to keep all of the animals under his watch in the safest condition he could, at the cost of his own health at times. Tonight was the full moon and that meant that the newest addition to the teaching staff of Hogwarts, other than him, was indisposed in the worst and most dangerous manner imaginable. With the threat of the ferocious wolf running around in the woods every month, Hagrid had been assured that the monster would keep well away from all of his precious creatures, like the very ones he was leading away at the moment because the bloodthirsty werewolf _had_ strayed near their herd and Hagrid didn’t want to risk their safety. The experienced groundskeeper didn’t mind the stigma attached to thestrals, nor did he let it deter him from his duty to them. He was well away from where he had heard the wolf’s cries and now felt that he could let the so-called death-creatures wander freely for the remainder of the night without them running into any lunar-related animals.

 

As he threw the pheasants he’d been using to lure the abnormally obstinate winged horses away with him, Hagrid saw a strange little thing out of the corner of his eye. It looked so short that, as it walked on its two hind legs, it probably wouldn’t be tall enough to stare at his belt-buckle directly, though its massive tail would probably reach the bottom of his beard easily if it was pointed straight upwards. Needless to say, Hagrid was already fascinated by it. The thestrals didn’t object to their new surroundings as they galloped off together, fighting over the offerings of dead birds and a few dead ferrets Hagrid had been planning to give to his Hippogriffs on account of their good behaviour in his classes, but he wouldn’t have trouble catching more so he didn’t see the harm. In the mean time, however, he was going to be hunting for something bigger and infinitely more interesting than ferrets, and appeared to be even more terrified of him than them.

 

It wasn’t like he wanted to catch or kill the small, fluffy animal, whatever it was; he just wanted to have a look at the sandy-coloured mammal. It was incredibly odd to see a new creature in the forest he’d been patrolling for decades, but even odder was that the thing was running on two legs and looked almost humanoid in its panicked movements away from him, though his comparisons to humans ended there as he watched the creature trip or fall over after every few strides.

 

Hagrid jogged as gently as a half-giant could after the strange animal that had captured his interest. Every once in a while he would see whatever he was chasing before it would disappear behind a tree or some roots. Hagrid chased the poor thing for well over an hour, never getting closer than thirty feet or so. Eventually he thought he might catch the scared little critter as it ran into a clearing, which was a relief to the tired man, but as luck would have it, in that very clearing stood the entire herd of thestrals he’d released earlier on. The strange light-brown creature seemed to hesitate at the sight of the thestrals, Hagrid noted, before it apparently cut its losses and ran straight into the midst of them. Hagrid feared the tiny and defenceless morsel would become an after-dinner snack for the emaciated carnivorous horse-monsters.

 

What the oafish man didn’t expect was for the thestrals to crowd around the thing and block it from his view. Hagrid tried to push through them or to get them to disperse in case they were indeed eating the defenceless animal in there, but every time he managed to shift one thestral, another would take its place and the moved one would rejoin the herd further away. Hagrid was reluctant to leave but the thestrals were not docile when angered and he couldn’t take on twenty of them when angry just to examine an idle curiosity. Plus, there was a good chance that whatever it was would be around the next night if it had survived this long in the huddle, so he would just have to let it be and hope it stayed alive.

 

\-----------------------------

 

Gaara’s midnight run hadn’t been nearly as relaxed as Hagrid’s had been, the tanuki-boy having had to sprint at top speed when he saw his Care of Magical Creatures professor chasing after him. Whilst his miniature form had the major drawback of shorter legs, meaning he was no way near his top speed in human form, furry-Gaara’s stamina made up for this shortfall quite adequately, as, even after an hour, he still wasn’t out of breath. Another problem Gaara had in his fluffy form was that his tail threw off his weighting, meaning every few metres he’d fall over or stumble. Destroying any hope of quickly developing the ability to run despite these drawbacks were the hateable legs he was attempting to run with. The abnormal joints and smaller surface area on which to spread his weight was completely at odds with his experience and physical memory of walking and running and so he spent almost as much time on the ground as he did running along it. It was downright embarrassing for a ninja of his calibre to be suffering these indignities. 

 

Gaara ducked and dived as quickly as his training in stealth and evasion had taught him to in order to avoid his teacher and the obviously awkward questions that would be incurred by his capture. He thought he’d run out of luck when he stumbled into a clearing in the middle of the woods filled with the skeletal horses that he had seen draw the carts that carried the students from the train station to the castle a few weeks prior. He stopped himself, falling over again from the inertia, trying to remember if he had heard the beasts before him be described along the lines of ‘small-tanuki-eating winged horses’. Deciding the risk would actually be worth keeping this secret safe, lest it become common knowledge that he was weakened once a month, Gaara started again towards the thestrals, planning to cut straight through them and keep running. To his astonishment, though, he was welcomed into the herd that parted to allow him access and closed off around him, giving him a protective barrier of, apparently, non-small-tanuki-eating winged horses; they were even careful not to stand on him or his sensitive tail. He’d discovered just how sensitive his tail was when he’d tried running with the thing in his arms and had cut into it a little with his claws. He would rather fall over with the thing swaying around behind him than cut it again.

 

The tanuki-boy waited with baited breath, as Hagrid tried to force his way into the herd, and only let out the breath he would never admit to holding in when the colossal man gave up and walked away with a dejected slump in his broad shoulders. Gaara disliked disappointing the obviously fanatical man, but his secret was now something he had to protect at any cost if he was retain both his safety and, maybe more importantly, his dignity. He was Sabaku no Gaara, he didn’t do small and fluffy!

 

When the magical beasts were alone in the clearing, transformed and non, Gaara felt it was safe enough to leave his temporary bodyguards and continue onwards. He had all night to look around and he didn’t like how the smaller, overly friendly, thestrals were nuzzling against his fluffy tail; it was unsettling to say the least. Leaving the inordinately affectionate animals, Gaara stumbled out from the forest of horse-like legs and back into the real forest to explore, and figure out exactly what he’d been turned into.

 

When he’d found a quiet place where he would be safe for a few moments, a cosy little alcove under a tree, Gaara sat down awkwardly and attempted to enter his mindscape to question the monster that was undoubtedly to blame for his confounded new form. The little fluffy serial killer was further irked when he couldn’t enter his mind like usual. If he was to turn back to his human form in the morning, he would spend a lengthy spell in his mind talking to his detainee, but until then he would just try to stay alive.

 

Gaara decided that self-preservation without sand was much simpler given the ability to run, so he put his full energies into developing that difficult yet vital skill. He spent a pain-filled hour trying in vain to run on his back legs like he had always as a human but that inevitably ended with him falling flat on his face, or on his back when he’d tried to stretch his…his tail out fully backwards. No matter what he tried or how he positioned his lead weight of a tail, he just couldn’t run. He could walk just fine, if a little wobbly because of the new legs ending in paws that were still very foreign to him. Frankly, Gaara had had an idea of how he could move more quickly some time ago, but despite the desperate circumstances he was presented with, he couldn’t bring himself to try it.

 

As Gaara, panting with his tongue hanging out like some stray dog, lay on the dewy midnight ground, he finally surrendered to his instincts and rolled over onto his front. Pushing against the ground with his hands/paws, Gaara moved his legs under him until he was on all fours. It was a strange feeling, now that his legs and arms were the same length, even more so as the position was infinitely more comfortable than his regular posture, which he’d tried to keep in this foreign form. Taking an experimental few steps forward, this animalistic stride was indeed much easier than his human one. With a deep breath and a low crouch before, Gaara set off in his first successful run in this bestial form. It was certainly exhilarating, if nothing else; Gaara was bounding along much faster than he could hope to run in his human form, though he wasn’t about to be thankful for this dislikeable turn of events.

 

When he’d finished his, admittedly fast, run, Gaara stopped off near a small lake in the middle of the woods. He wasn’t going to drink from it, his pride had suffered enough blows for one night, but the water’s still and reflective surface would serve another useful purpose. Peering into the mirror-like lake, Gaara was finally able to see just how bad his transformation had been.

 

It was bad.

 

He still had his red hair on the top of his head and his green eyes, which was a comfort of sorts as he had briefly feared that he would have Shukaku’s distinctive demonic irises. Under his fringe lay his tattoo, his reminder. The only other facial feature that he recognised as himself were the permanent dark circles around his eyes, though they had become much more pronounced than they had been before, which was saying something. The tattoo, now that he looked closely, inching towards the water’s edge, looked blurred and faded, which was to be expected as was the darkening of the black circles around his eyes, when he saw that, unlike before when they were simple skin pigmentations or modifications, they were now colourations of his fur.

 

Gaara’s eyes were then drawn to where his human ears had disappeared from, only for them to be replaced by large tanuki ones, much like Shukaku’s own, including the blue tips. He was annoyed to find that they, like his tail, twitched and reacted to his mood as shown by their current downward pointing position, displaying his predictably negative feelings. What was worse was that they were much larger than Shukaku’s miniature ears, drooping down almost to Gaara’s slumped shoulders.

 

His entire body was covered in the soft, fine, sandy-coloured fur, including his face which now looked more animal than human, even having a muzzle rather than just a regular nose, and on the end of said muzzle sat a small pink rhinarium. The blue markings present on all of his body, so much like those found on Shukaku’s body, also seemed to be arranged so that they centred in on Gaara’s belly which he was glad to see didn’t have the same exaggerated rotund appearance that his unwelcome tenant had; instead, the markings swirled around the seal on his stomach. The seal, like his tattoo and the signs of his insomnia and possession, was in the colouration of his fur now and so didn’t disappear when he stopped channelling chakra, not that he could use any chakra in this form. The only thing left to examine was his gigantic tail which he had had to look behind himself to see before, and only now could he truly appreciate its enormous size and girth next to his laughably tiny body.

 

Now satisfied that he knew at least what he was dealing with, Gaara moved away from his temporary mirror in order to perfect the running he should’ve mastered in his infancy and also to see the extent of his tail’s formidable power when he used it as an almighty club.

 

The running didn’t take as long to learn as he had feared, being largely instinctual when he ran on all four paws, but the tail swinging was more difficult it seemed, as more than once he found himself losing his footing when the weight of it was moved too quickly or too far away from his centre of gravity. What he was happy to see was that the tail was actually able to leave a sizable dent in the bark of a tree he hit it with. Gaara had little doubt that if he had to, he could easily wind somebody with this useful appendage, which was a welcome thought despite his previous abilities overshadowing this by no small measure.

 

Through this fascinating learning experience, Gaara had regrettably neglected to keep his sensitive fuzzy ears, now perked up in excitement, concentrated on his surroundings and so missed the ominous wheezing sound nearing him at an alarming speed. Only when the temperature plummeted and his fur bristled in warning did Gaara finally notice the dementor that was now floating down from the canopy, focussed on Gaara. The small fluffy creature weighed up his severely limited options in an instant: fight or flight. Considering his fighting capabilities were currently limited to his sharp yet tiny claws and his humongous tail, both of which were completely useless against a dementor, which he had seen in the past recover from even the most brutal blunt-force traumas, only dying when it was pierced through the head, which was an impossible task for his woefully short claws.

 

As his options, however limited, flew through his mind, Gaara watched the nightmarish monster descend upon him. The ghoulish entity swooped down on the shivering Gaara, though he would deny that assessment to the bitter end, with all of the grace one would expect from the Grim Reaper reconnecting with an old acquaintance. By the time he had clearly assessed the situation, once he was able to fight back the fear that was so foreign to him having had a solid stone wall of protection surrounding him all of his life, Gaara realised that he had no options left to him; he could not fight for lack of strength and weapons, and he could not run because the abomination in front of him was clearly much faster and stronger than him at the moment. Gaara could only remember one other time in his life when he had been completely defenceless and helpless, when he had lost to the boy who was just like him, on the day of the Chunin exam finals. Although the fight had technically been a draw, neither party officially losing, Gaara knew he had lost then, and now he had lost again and for the same reason, because he had no one to rely upon; but this time he didn’t have his brother and sister to drop down and protect him in his moment of vulnerability, he was once again alone in the world because he had failed to trust someone, anyone, yet again.

 

Not one to go out without some measure of a fight, Gaara got up onto his back legs and prepared himself for his very own miniature battle of Thermopylae, ready to fight until the bitter end. The dementor took one final passing sweep towards the snarling mini-bijū before it abruptly turned and began to move back towards the tree tops, seemingly disinterested with the angry little animal.

 

Whilst Gaara watched what he had been sure was finally going to kill him fly back into the blackened sky, he fell backwards onto his tail, which made for a comfortable beanbag-style seat, in a sudden moment overwhelmed shock. He couldn’t believe he’d survived another near death experience. By the way the dementors had been drawn to him in the past, he’d assumed they were attracted to the power he held within him, but apparently he’d been mistaken; either he was mistaken or dementors couldn’t sense the souls of animals, but that was obviously not right. Who would employ prison guards that didn’t account for any animals?

 

Gaara spent the rest of the night roaming around the woods, avoiding any and all noises he heard for fear of smarter dementors that might finish the job of the last one that had almost scared him to death. By the end of the night, Gaara was happy to note that he had mastered running again; then again, he wasn’t going to go and shout about his mastery of running on all fours, but he was still secretly pleased, even allowing a small smirk to appear on his canid face, briefly revealing the rows of tiny razor sharp teeth, before disappearing again.

 

As the black of night began to turn into dark blue, Gaara started on his way back to wherever he had left his clothes at the beginning of his latest ‘adventure’. Once again, his thoughts were dragged back to whether or not he would indeed turn back into a human in an hour or so when the sun peaked over the horizon, otherwise he was going to have a much more problematic time ahead of him, like the explanations he would have to make, and trying to turn back through his own power or with help from another. Before he could worry any more about his form, Gaara had a more imminent problem that he had underestimated earlier on, and that was how difficult it was to trace his steps back to where he’d left his clothes, especially when he had fled in a panic from his professor. On that note, he would have to be careful around Professor Hagrid for the next few days so that he wasn’t recognised inadvertently for the similarities between his true form and this one. 

 

It took a lot longer than Gaara had expected to find his discarded garments, which were very cold and dewy after a long night in the burrow of a tree. Nevertheless, he waited on baited breath for the sun to finally show its face and let him turn back into a human. As the blinding white light of the nearest star rose into sight, Gaara felt the more than welcome and so very familiar feeling of changing, like he had at the beginning of the night and he did not fight the sensation as it spread over his small body.

 

Unlike before, though, the human weapon didn’t pass out during the transformation, so he got to experience the strange and uncomfortable sensation of his body physically morphing into a different form. As the fur crept back into his skin and his tail receded in his spine, Gaara felt his bones creak as they too became human again, reverting to their regular size and shape. The experience was not painless, it was not quick and it was not fun, but once it was over and done with, Gaara was better off for it as far as he was concerned.

 

Sluggishly, the newly formed body picked itself off of the ground, letting go a sigh of relief at seeing his body once again in the correct shape, and stumbled over to his waiting clothes as quickly as he could. He put on his damp clothes eagerly, having had quite enough of the freezing morning air in direct contact with his skin. Fighting off a shiver as he dressed himself, he did a once-over to check there were no lasting effects of his transformation, to which he thankfully found none, other than his sore throat. An experimental attempted hum proved that his voice was still lost to him, disappointingly.

 

Now dressed and ready to make the long (and apparently unnecessary) walk back to the castle, Gaara called the sand out of his pocket with the ease gained from years of repetition and cast his long-awaited _Third Eye_ technique. He sent the orb into the air, so high that, when activated, he could see tens of miles all around him; he really was a very long way away from Hogwarts. He immediately started off running and hopping. If he was lucky, he would make it back to the castle in time for lunch, as he was feeling incredibly fatigued from all of the exertions in the last twelve hours and could do with a good meal. Luckily, it seemed he had not forgotten how to run as a human after a night on all fours. When the trees became a little denser, Gaara leapt up to one of the branches before jumping onwards from tree to tree, making much better time than he had on his way outwards.

 

As he flew through the air, periodically bouncing off of another thick tree branch, Gaara wondered why there seemed to be so few animals in the forest. Even normal forests back in his world had more wildlife than this one, and this was supposed to be the ‘Forbidden Forest’, named so because of all of the dangerous and dark creatures there; but so far that night, he’d only encountered a herd of overly friendly winged horses and the gigantic groundskeeper, neither of which seemed all that scary to the boy who had fought a toad the size of Hogwarts and lived. Where all of the deadly animals he’d been told about were, he didn’t know, but it seemed a little misleading nonetheless.

 

His question was answered all too soon when the trees became too far in-between to jump across efficiently, and he was forced to move along the earth again. As he continued to run, wondering idly how he was going to explain his absence upon his return, Gaara felt a familiar rumbling. It wasn’t his stomach...well, it mostly wasn’t his stomach; the almost quaking ground reminded him of the last time he’d had to trek back through the forest after his fall off his feathered transportation, but that time he had needed medical attention too urgently to check it out. This time the rumbling was coming from the general direction of the castle, meaning it was in his path anyway and he could fight off most regular animals with just the small amount of sand he was carrying, so he wasn’t worried in any case, and taking a detour to avoid it wouldn’t be nearly as interesting.

 

Gaara began to slow down as the rumbling intensified; he noticed that the deafening noise was oscillating slowly and steadily. Gaara wasn’t usually one to succumb to curiosity like this, being too sensible for such treacherous actions, but living in a world where he was treated like a child had apparently worn down his resistance to his immature impulses. As he walked into an area clearly inhabited by a large animal, if the compacted soil and snapped twigs were any indication, Gaara began to work out what the rumbling he was approaching was. He had definitely heard it before in his own world, albeit much quieter, but couldn’t quite place it.

 

When the rumbling was interrupted by a loud and vulgar snort, Gaara remembered the first time he had heard the annoying noise. Annoying, because he had first heard it when he was eight years-old, living in Kankuro and Temari’s apartment, and he had managed to wrestle Shukaku into getting an hour of real sleep without demonic possession, one rare night. He had been asleep for less than half an hour when he was awoken by the very same rumbling, coming from his brother’s room. Needless to say that Gaara had not been happy, being woken up by Kankuro’s loud snores. The teenage puppet-user had had a narrow escape that night as Gaara tried in earnest to kill his kin for snoring too loudly. That night taught Kankuro never to sleep on his back ever again.

 

Now that Gaara knew he was approaching a snoring giant, he became a touch more wary, knowing that anything large enough to snore that deafeningly loud would have to be a veritable behemoth. Still, he’d come this far, he’d been hungrier before and he’d already missed the first few hours of school, so he really wasn’t in any hurry to get there, and he could defend himself adequately. Compared to his previous state, Gaara was feeling positively invincible.

 

He continued forward into the creature’s den, but had to do a double-take, an action he disliked performing, after he saw what he had assumed was an abandoned hot tub. As he looked again, paying closer scrutiny to the object, he saw that it was in fact a giant food bowl. It didn’t take a prodigious shinobi to realise that whatever he was walking towards was truly enormous. He heard shuffling just a little further on, so he didn’t get an opportunity to read the creature’s name off of the side of the dish as he pressed onwards.

 

Then he saw _it_.

 

He had heard of this creature before, or something like it, in his world, as a myth of course, or should he say these creatures. He stared across at the three faces connected to three necks connected to one body and thought it might be the single largest dog he’d ever seen. The enormous brown, three-headed, Staffordshire bull-terrier was clearly asleep, curiously only two of the heads were snoring, the one in the middle was sleeping silently with a snot-bubble the size of Gaara’s head inflating and deflating in time with the dog’s heavy breathing. Deciding his curiosity had been sated sufficiently, Gaara concluded he should let sleeping three-headed dogs lie and make a hasty retreat before he woke the beast/s up. Fighting a dog that large with that many mouths could be hazardous to his health.

 

He didn’t make it more than five steps back before he heard the heavy rhythmic breathing hitch and a deep grumbling sound replace it. Turning around, Gaara saw what he had hoped he would not; his just desserts for listening to his demons, the figurative ones; the real one was now calling for him to use its chakra to save the both of them. Oh, how nice it was to hear the old voices in his head again.

 

The Cerberus had definitely woken up and didn’t look too happy about the tiny wake-up call that was still slowly retreating. Gaara’s mind quickly began to work on how he could defeat the hellish dog with the minute amount of sand he had on his person. Deciding he had no choice but to kill the beast, he hardened the sand into a foot long, razor sharp spike and readied it to be fired off into the dogs’ waiting heart. The animal turned all three of its heads into the air and took a sniff before turning back to Gaara with a determined look set upon all of its faces. The appetiser of a boy watched it slowly stalk towards him but didn’t fire off his sand, knowing he only had one shot in which to kill the canine and could ill afford to miss.

 

As the three giant heads bore down on Gaara’s still form, they gave one more sniff before opening their mouths, their mouths filled with enormous, pointy teeth and the stench of decaying meat. Gaara, for his part, was staying absolutely still on the off chance that the dog would tire of him and he wouldn’t need to kill it. The mouths, each big enough for him to climb inside of comfortably, positioned themselves all around him, showing that they were indeed going to attack. The encircling mouths moved in closer to the boy, as said boy raised his hand in preparation to fire the sand-senbon through the central head’s throat and into where its heart should be.

 

And then it all came to a head when Gaara felt his left side heat up suddenly, feeling almost on fire with the burning warmth before his right followed suit. His vision went black and he still didn’t fire his weapon. When the warmth left him, Gaara disgustedly felt how wet the three gigantic tongues had left him after their joyful licking of his entire body. Lowering his arm slowly, reluctantly, Gaara saw and smelt the panting and excited dog before him, wearing no malevolent expressions, just doggish joy. He considered still attacking the dog for the grievous insult to his already bruised ego, as the enormous patches of dog saliva dripped to the ground, but couldn’t bring himself to do it when the dogs sat back on their haunches and looked at him expectantly with absolutely no malice on their faces.

 

Gaara had no idea why the animals of this world were so enamoured with him, but he wasn’t sure whether it was a blessing or a curse as he continued on his way, ignoring the dogs’ pained whines at being left alone again. Gaara wasn’t an animal person anyway, having been scorned by one too many animals in his own world who would try to attack him after sensing the malicious chakra he held. Then there was the incident in his youth when he had been lusting after blood and came across the zoo... Still, Gaara had no real hatred for animals, so his grudge against the sad looking and friendly acting dog couldn’t withstand the soft nudging his back received every few steps from the right head’s nose. Turning around, Gaara lessened his glare at the oversized puppy and patted each dog’s nose in a friendly gesture with the hope that the dog would then leave him alone after being shown some kindness.

 

Apparently not.

 

Even as he continued on his way, the uproarious sounds of the dog attempting to follow him inconspicuously was noticeable to say the least, so Gaara turned around again, with a measured reluctance, to address the _issue_. He couldn’t very well bring the giant mutt back to the castle, even if it was a pet of one of the professors, so he tried to think of a quick and humane solution to his problem so he could leave and wash off the copious amounts of saliva he was plastered in as quick as possible. He soon came up with an idea that might just work. Standing at his full height, which wasn’t all that impressive to begin with, and turning on his Death Glare, he looked in the central dog’s eyes and pointed at the floor in the harshest and most menacing manner he could. The dogs’ heads, with their ears down flat, immediately bowed all three heads and sat back down as per Gaara’s silent command. The mute teen was happy with this result as it meant that dog was trained to some degree at least and would respond to non-verbal commands.

 

Gaara, in yet another and seemingly increasingly frequent spur of childish enthrallment and curiosity, tried a few more simple command-gestures like ‘lie down’ and ‘roll over’ before he realised he’d wasted much more time than he should have allowed himself to, playing with a possibly stray dog. Telling the dog to stay, Gaara patted each of the Cerberus’ heads, having to jump a little each time, before leaving quickly and ever-quietly. He could hear the dogs whine pathetically for the next mile of his trek, before it was cut off by a few resounding barks and a heavy thudding that faded fast as they both moved further away from one another.

 

As he continued running, deciding against washing off for the moment when he saw the edges of the one of the ponds he passed over frosted lightly, telling him just how cold the water was likely to be, Gaara smiled at the thought that popped into his head suddenly, of training the overgrown puppy to fight for him like a summon animal. He could just imagine it running towards his enemy and then running back just as fast with its tail between its legs.

 

By the time Gaara reached the edge of the Forbidden Forest, the dog saliva that had covered him, literally from head to toe, was almost dry, thanks to the shining sun and the freezing autumn wind that he had been running against for the past half hour. Gaara had been happily surprised when he hadn’t been engaged by any dementors on his return journey. The mute red-head was beginning to seriously doubt the wizarding world’s security if their prison guards couldn’t sense animals and didn’t come out when the sun was shining. But he was probably just over thinking things.

 

Another worrying point was that he was effectively sneaking back into Hogwarts in the middle of the day and so far no one had seen him or questioned his motives, or even noticed his re-entry. If he was a rogue, escaped mass-murderer, like some people he could mention, Gaara could have already snuck into the school and killed Harry Potter and half a dozen other people and escaped again, all within ten minutes. He was almost tempted to prove his point, but that wasn’t what he did anymore, even if the boy was annoying.

 

Though, while it had seemed so very easy to slip into Hogwarts, past all of the supposed wards and protections, getting past the hoards of students and the occasional teacher was not so simple. Gaara had never specialised in stealth, that was Kankuro’s forte, he was a frontline fighter, so he was not in his element as he evaded detection. Sure, he could fight his way in, but that wasn’t really the subtle entrance he was working towards. It took him nearly thirty minutes to actually enter the castle, having had to find an entrance that wasn’t filled with students chatting endlessly and apparently without regard for their classes.

 

The reason the ‘heavy artillery’ was attempting to sneak into the castle, other than the probable fear his sudden appearance might induce in any nearby students, was because he hadn’t exactly signed-out the night before and his entering back into the castle would strongly imply that he had, at some point, left the castle without permission. This discovery could lead to all sorts of related rule-breaking he had undertaken the night before, not least his assault on Draco Malfoy and his killing several dementors on his way into the _Forbidden_ Forest, to name a few. Then there was the slight chance that someone might connect his stalking off into the forest with Hagrid’s accounts of a strange new animal. All in all, it was certainly wisest to take the path of secrecy on this one and just not say a word about what he had been up to the night before, not that he could say anything anyway, though this would just make his silence on the matter all the easier.

 

It took even longer to get back into the dungeons, having to go so far as to knock out three or four more students, all Slytherins, on his way to enter the common room. Gaara figured, since he was already on the line for knocking out his roommate, there really wasn’t much harm in sending a few housemates, who had decided to spend their lunch break in their common room, to an early night’s rest at one o’clock in the afternoon. From the common room, Gaara then had to throw a smoke bomb into the corridor leading to the dorms; luckily, everyone present was convinced that this ‘prank’ was perpetrated by the notorious Weasley Twins. The twins later denied this accusation fiercely, upset by the audacity of a fellow prankster hitting Slytherin before they had a chance to, that year. Fred and George decided then that they would have to do something big to regain their, imaginary, titles of ‘Lord Pranksters’ after being shown up not once but twice.

 

Meanwhile, Gaara had slipped into his shared room and deposited the tiny amount of sand he had carried with him, into his dearly missed gourd. Every time he left his sand he always regretted it. Knowing he had at least a few hours before Draco returned from classes or dinner, Gaara changed into his bed clothes after wiping the last of the dog spit from his person and readied himself to confront the beast within. It didn’t help that the act of getting into his pajamas made the stoic ninja remember the time a certain _someone_ had decided no Jinchūriki should be without a goofy nightcap made to look like something eating your head. Despite his clear and reasonable objections to wearing the abomination, Gaara had worn it that one time to stop his ‘most generous’ friend sulking and pouting all mission long. Those joint Konoha-Suna missions were trying times. Soon, Gaara was able to clear his head of... distractions, and then he was ready. Sitting down on his bed, he called his sand to attention so that it would be ready to protect him instantly should any threat appear while he was out.

 

Closing his tired, blackened eyes, Gaara concentrated like he had done in the forest; this time, however, he successfully found himself in the desert of his mind, complete with a sandstorm on the horizon and the nearby red-rocked cave, his destination. Gaara walked into the sheltering cave and continued downwards until he came upon his hidden burden.

 

It seemed he wasn’t the only one to suffer the night before.

 

Enormous pillars of sand, acting as a barrier to his conscious mind, used to stand like bars to a great cage across the cave, but now those bars were gone and Shukaku was stood flat against the wall. Well, the beast didn’t have much of a choice in his position as his giant hands appeared to have been impaled, by equally large nails of sand, to the bedrock behind them. As soon as the captive caught sight of his warden, having previously been too distracted by the pain to notice him coming, he began to howl and scream with such fury that had not been seen since his days as the boy’s stand-in mother, demanding blood sacrifices and the like. Gaara didn’t hold any sympathy for the monster before him, remembering the pain it had caused him and the fact that it would heal as soon as the nails were removed, still, he did wince every time the tanuki pulled at the bonds only to yelp and roar with pain. The worst part was that despite the obvious agony caused, Shukaku kept on pulling against them, eliciting more shrieks of tortured anguish.

 

Gaara didn’t know if his demon was just tenacious, or doing it to make him cringe.

 

Ignoring his discomfort, hearing such familiar sounds, Gaara waited for Shukaku to finish his wailing so that he could find out what exactly had happened inside of his mind and soul. He had never heard of a seal spontaneously changing like this, but then he had also never heard of a shinobi travelling across worlds like he had. Eventually, after what honestly seemed like hours, the Ichibi finished and slumped down against his restraints, breathing in long heavy breaths.

 

“What happened?” Gaara asked in his usual direct manner after the longest time, his patience having lost out to his impertinence.

 

“Waddya mean ‘what happened’!?” Shukaku roared at its host, pulling against its restraints again to try and attack, over and over. “My hands’ve been nailed to a wall, you stupid little weapon!”

 

“You don’t know what happened, then?” Gaara asked.

 

“Well,” Shukaku had a most disturbing smirk set into his maw as he considered his words, “I don’t know _why_ that happened last night, but I most certainly did see it. I watched the whole night out of your eyes.” Gaara stilled, realising the demon now had material for annoying him for years to come. He prepared himself for what was to come. “You were absolutely adorable! Such a cute baby tanuki! Remember, you need to eat all of your humans if you want to grow up big and strong like ya mama!”

 

Gaara winced as the roars of laughter exceeded the earlier pained screams in intensity.

 

“I can’t wait for next month, you make almost as bad a tanuki as you do a human!”

 

“Be quiet.”

 

“Admit it, you’re going soft. You’re getting weak. Soon enough, one of these real humans is going to come and kill you. They’ll end your existence and you’ll have never existed. Hell, that cloaked thing last night almost finished you off.”

 

“The weakness last night was because of the form. On my way out, I killed several dementors with ease. The only weakness I have is that I am still alone.”

 

“You’ll stay alone! Kill them all, just like your mother told you to, like she wanted!”

 

Gaara looked up at the beast of scorn, considering him for a few moments before ever-calmly saying, “...I’m leaving.”

 

As he walked out of the cave, he heard more jeers and mockery but paid them no heed whatsoever. He’d had his fill of dealing with Shukaku for the day, and his tiresome conversation had revealed little to him other than the fact that his beast could view events directly when he was transformed on the full moon; an altogether useless discovery.

 

When he was stood in the surface plains of his mind, Gaara closed his eye and waited to wake up.

 

Still sat in his bed, Gaara looked over to the ‘magical’ alarm clock and saw that it was just about dinner time for the rest of the school, though, he wasn’t nearly hungry enough to warrant changing again or going through the arduous task of getting out of bed to eat yet, so he decided he’d just wait until breakfast. And this way he could postpone explaining his actions last night to his roommate. Either way it was going to be difficult task, but he was happy with later rather than sooner when concerned with the difficult and possibly embarrassing explanations he would have to give. Truth be told, things wouldn’t be embarrassing at all, seeing as how the real humiliation would be kept to himself.

 

But they were only really excuses in the first place. He just didn’t want to get out of bed.

 

Whilst he considered his explanation, no matter how flimsy any attempted excuse would end up being, he played about with his sand, manipulating the shape and his control over it. He soon grew tired with the same movements and practices so he looked around for something to amuse him whilst he waited for his inevitable chewing-out, then he had a thought. Drawing the handful of sand over to the corner of the room, the tanuki-host commanded the sand to grind against the stone of the wall and try to convert it into more sand. The stone was strong and resilient, but eventually it began to wear away, little by little and after five minutes of crushing and refining, during which he had pulled out another book, Gaara found that he had made another handful of sand, albeit in a darker colour. The visible damage to the wall was minimal and probably wouldn’t be noticed in the shady corner. The sand he had created, he noticed, was a little more sluggish than his normal sand, it wouldn’t impede his everyday movement of it, but it could hinder him if his were to fight seriously with it in large quantities. However, by spreading it thinly within his older sand and diffusing his unique chakra into the new sand, it seemed to act more normally.

 

Thinking again, Gaara realised that he wasn’t likely going to be using large quantities of this sand, as he would literally need to tear down the castle to do so. He was fairly certain someone would miss a tower if it were to go missing; no matter how dilapidated some of the castle appeared to be at times.

 

Over an hour after Gaara had awoken from his communication with Shukaku, just about when dinner in the Great Hall was probably about to finish, Draco burst into the bedroom abruptly, startling Gaara a little from his seat on the bed, reading ‘Hogwarts a History’. Before Gaara could question his roommate on his less than graceful entrance, in followed Severus Snape with a smug look of righteousness that disappeared quickly when he spotted the bewildered Gaara sitting in bed reading a book.

 

“You see, sir; he’s been there all day!” Draco said as he regained his composure and tried to think of a way of looking down his nose at a man who was at least a foot and a half taller than him. He settled for a haughty look with an arched eyebrow.

 

Unknown to the two others, of all present Draco was the most surprised by far by Gaara’s presence, but that just goes to show how well his father had taught him to maintain his composure even when he came upon obstacles like having to lie to everyone about how his roommate was ill in bed all day because said roommate had disappeared last night after somehow knocking him out and had not reappeared since.

 

Snape, to his credit, stayed largely calm after his suspicions were soundly proven incorrect about his current favourite verbal punching bag. He knew Gaara wasn’t a lycanthrope, despite how satisfying that would have been, but his absence the day after a full moon was still a cause for concern. Still, there was no proof of wrongdoing, yet, and he had nothing to go on. He did, however, direct a suspicious glare at both the boys present, one of which who was still none the wiser about his close call with truancy. Seeing the innocence in Gaara’s curious yet hardened eyes, Snape made one more frustrated growling sound before storming out in a huff.

 

Sagging a little now that the tension that had been building had dissipated, Gaara leaned back into his bed and raised his book again so that he could continue and avoid what was coming. Draco had other plans.

 

“What in Merlin’s name did you do last night!?” To say that Draco looked furious would be to say that Orochimaru was ambitious, if the vein in the side of his head and accusatory glare was any indication at all. “I’ve spent all day lying about where you were, and you went and knocked me unconscious last night!”

 

“...”

 

“Snape was going to kill us if you hadn’t been here.” Draco was too proud to admit that he was a little hurt that his friend had saw fit to render him unconscious rather than tell him his problem; he wouldn’t even admit to himself that he had been worried that his friend was hurt when he didn’t return all day.

 

‘I’m sorry.’ Gaara sand was in the air swiftly and silently. ‘I have things I need to do sometimes.’

 

“You didn’t have to knock me out! And cut that out, use your copy-thing to speak for you,” Draco shouted indignantly, looking more than a little exasperated at Gaara’s lack of remorse at the assault, both physical and on his dignity.

 

‘Sorry. I won’t do it again.’ He ignored the command to use a clone to speak. If he made a habit of doing it he might have to become a conversationalist. And Gaara really did feel bad, about knocking Draco out and now hiding things from him, knowing full well he’d have to hide his escape next month as well in a similar manner.

 

Gaara still considered his newest secret to be well guarded, but what he had failed to take into consideration was the fastidious attention to detail Draco prided himself on, even if he did sometimes miss the obvious things, like a pair of Polyjuice-impersonated henchmen sneaking into his common room to question him on his heritage last year. What Draco _had_ noticed, was something Gaara hadn’t even taken into account the night before. Draco had noticed last night that Gaara hadn’t taken his gourd with him, wherever he had gone to. The same gourd that Gaara refused to leave anywhere out of his reach, that when he had deposited it last time, he had fell off a hippogriff and almost died. Draco didn’t yet know the significance of this observation, but one day he would come to fully understand. And that day was fast approaching.

 

As the evening wore on, Draco began to forgo his petty grievance and sulking and fill Gaara in on the day’s events whilst he did his homework, and helpfully and dutifully relayed the day’s homework assignments to a plenty thankful Gaara. Eventually, when they were both done for the night, Gaara having done markedly more work than Draco, they settled down for a full night’s sleep.

 

Gaara was always thankful for this luxury, and it could never be overstated.

 

\-----------------------------

 

The next morning, as early as a ‘growed up’ ninja was supposed to wake up, Gaara rose fully reenergised and ready to take on another day of tribulations courtesy of both the teachers and student body around him. Of course, Draco still hadn’t accustomed himself to waking up at the same reasonable hour as Gaara, but being the kind and perfectly gentle roommate that Gaara was, he took absolutely no pleasure in ripping the sheets off of Draco’s bed and rolling him onto the floor. It was the same method he used to wake up Kankuro all the time, though he had only used it on Temari once because she had overslept and they had a mission to go on. He only did it the once, and that’s all that needs to be said about that.

 

This incident, with Draco sprawled out on the cold floor, growling, however, ended in a much more amicable manner, whereby the injured party crawled to the door and then stumbled out to the showers whilst mumbling dark words under his breath. The words ‘killing’ and ‘cruciatus’ were muttered a few times, Gaara lazily noted as he got ready for the day also. When Draco slumped back into the room, giving Gaara a glare he knew Draco had been working on. Gaara then went to take his own shower, glad that he hadn’t smelled at all animalistic from his previous night’s episode. It was a wonder he had been able to do so little the day before, but then, that just left him with all the more energy to continue with today’s probable trials.

 

After showering, dressing and gladly slinging his gourd to his back, Gaara and Draco made their way to get breakfast, Gaara walking unnoticeably faster than normal to get there. They both sat with the Slytherin moderates, as was mandated by the divided fear and loathing of the rest of their house; though, that wasn’t to say that a large majority of the Slytherins who _were_ willing to sit near the pair weren’t saddened by Gaara’s reappearance. Nonetheless, all of those around Gaara politely and, in one or two meek cases, sincerely greeted their bone-chilling housemate back into good health. Even a few of the blood purists who weren’t overly suspicious of Gaara’s heritage greeted him, which made the red-head happy, even if they were false smiles. That they were willing to try and pretend to be nice to him was still nicer than being ignored or abjectly hated.

 

Despite the massive _changes_ of the day before last, classes that day were all too familiar, potions being the worst example of these reoccurrences.

 

It seemed that Snape was going to even greater lengths than before to belittle and outright attack Gaara at every opportunity. It honestly surprised the silent receiver that the professor had the vocabulary and tenacity to keep up such a malevolent barrage for almost the entire two hour class, it was almost a feat of endurance. The broad range of insults also didn’t disappoint, reaching even to Gaara’s late illness and apparent laziness for shirking off work more than ‘that layabout Potter’, who was coincidentally sitting ten feet behind Snape with a serene expression of calm on his face as he listened to someone else receive the torment he had had to for years. Granted, Harry had never been so overtly preyed upon by the potions master, not often at least, but he was certainly not going to get involved and inadvertently switch Snape back onto insulting him just yet.

 

What Gaara and the rest of the class didn’t know was that their teacher’s fury had been caused by three factors. The first being his obvious, eternal and unexplained disdain for Gaara, the second being that despite his adamant protests to the contrary, his application to have Gaara removed from his class had been rejected by the headmaster despite his honest safety concerns, and thirdly was that he had been kept up for the past week, brewing the Wolfsbane potion for the detestable Remus Lupin by order of the same headmaster. These three combined had lead to the mother of all headaches that he refused to have cured by that overbearing Pomfrey when his own cure was sure to kick-in in only a few minutes. Only after an hour and a half of verbally bashing his student, intermittently broken up by bouts of teaching his craft, did his migraine begin to wane.

 

When his head was finally clear again, he began to survey all of the students’ cauldrons rather than just watching and waiting for Gaara to make a mistake, which was far too often in any case, further proving his case against Gaara being allowed to practice, if not learn, potions. Sadly, even though his headache was just clearing, and even though he had predicted this would happen, even Snape was surprised when Gaara’s concoction set several desks, numerous books, large portions of the ceiling and a small tuft of Neville Longbottom’s hair alight. The fire was promptly quashed by Gaara’s sand in all but Neville’s case, where Hermione Granger had hit him around the side of the head with one of her tomes without considering the obvious concussion that would amount.

 

The official accident report that was prompted by Neville Longbottom’s and several others’ admittance in the infirmary for burns, concussions and various other traumas, concluded that Gaara would be suspended from practicing and, for the sake of his and the professor’s health, reading potions until a safety review had been undertaken.

 

After the incident, when the infirm had been taken to the infirmary, Severus Snape wasn’t angry about what happened.

 

Voldemort was angry that he was defeated by an infant. Sirius Black was angry at Peter Pettigrew for killing their friends and framing him. Goblins were angry at the inflated tax rates imposed by the Ministry’s Financing Regulatory Committee.

 

Snape was more than angry.

 

The students fled their seats as they heard actual and serious curses being hurled at Gaara, and by extension Draco, as they too ran. Only after the two delinquents had vacated the room could the rest of the class return to their seats and try not to make a noise as they finished their potions. Snape took one hundred points from his own house, a first, and went into a closet to curse in a different way for the next thirty minutes. Needless to say, by the end of that period a few of the more innocent of the class were crying when they heard the muffled yells of what Snape was saying.

 

As Draco and Gaara jogged away from the potions cellar, hoping they weren’t being pursued and thankful for the ultimate shield that had undoubtedly saved their cherished good health, Draco wondered if Gaara had messed up his potion so spectacularly on purpose for revenge against the snide professor’s words. With nothing else to do for the morning until their next class and the looming threat of attack if they ventured too close to their Potions classroom to go to their common room, the pair decided to go for a stroll through the school. Well, for the aristocrat of the pair, it was a stroll, for the seasoned (and herbed) killer, it was, as usual, a scouting mission.

 

While they were walking, Draco told a few stories about his first two years at Hogwarts for which Gaara had been absent. Draco’s stories were fairly plain for the most part, though a few sensational ones did pop up when they were about combating Potter in some petty manner or another. It seemed to Gaara like most of the antagonism between the two rivals was caused by boredom rather than blood purity. That one story about him tattling on Harry and his friends when they went to see a baby dragon (Gaara had stopped questioning some things), made him smile a little when Draco admitted he had acted poorly... for someone of his standing. At one point, the pureblood even admitted he had been a bit of a bigot when he had called Granger a ‘mudblood’ just because she insulted his honour.

 

Were Gaara a less refined Jinchūriki, he might have used his sand to mould a simple question mark above his head regarding the term Draco and several other Slytherins had used, but being the educated person that he was, Gaara had his sand form the full ‘Pardon?’ to which Draco explained the term. He had the decency to look a little embarrassed as he told Gaara about how offensive some people found it, to be called a mudblood.

 

It was the surest sign of progress so far. It made Gaara smile.

 

Gaara stopped smiling. Gaara sighed.

 

Up ahead was an underclassman being bullied...again. This familiar sight immediately spurred Gaara’s tactical mind into action as he planned to look for an easy way to get out of his classrooms without always running into these situations that he just _had_ to help with. Both of the third-years walked onwards into the scene, where a group of second-year Ravenclaw girls were levitating a pair of their peer’s shoes in the air, out her reach. Without a word, as a team, Gaara used his sand to retrieve the floating shoes and Draco maliciously threatened to set Gaara on the bullies if they didn’t run along quickly. Gaara didn’t like being used as a weapon, nor did he like doing all of the work, but he figured he and Draco were good enough friends for that sort of thing. Besides, friends of Draco’s calibre get woken up even earlier in the morning to start the day, according to Rock Lee. Who was Gaara to argue with the tried and tested methods of social interaction of such an obviously well balanced individual?

 

After the other girls had run off in terror, the remaining girl, the subject of the bullying, looked to her knights in shining armour and thanked them. “Thank you very much. They usually just leave them some place high up so I have to climb to get them. I was never much good at the levitation spell myself, you see; I don’t know why...” She seemed to drift out of her own introduction for a moment, her eyes wandering to the ceiling before she turned back to the pair she had been addressing with the startled look of someone who had forgot there was someone else in the room; “I’m Luna Lovegood, by the way.”

 

Draco ignored the girl’s airy thanks, not interested in being told what he was doing was right by a stranger. Stranger still, when he considered the girl’s appearance, complete with radish earrings and vacant stare. Draco didn’t know much about female fashion trends, not nearly as much as his attentive mother might have liked, but he knew that a girl was not meant to wear radishes on her ears. That was not marriage, or friend, material. Uninterested as he was, Draco nodded his acceptance and went to lean against the wall whilst his friend finished up with their irksome spontaneous good deed.

 

It occurred to Draco that he would have to check his and Gaara’s behaviour in future lest they continue to act like goody-two-shoes and become The Golden Duo. He wasn’t about to turn into another Potter.

 

Gaara approached the younger girl who was, to his hidden shame, the same height as him, and presented her stolen shoes to her. “Thank you very much, mister Gaara.” She took the shoes gently, and smiled brightly at the secretly peeved diminutive teenager and then thought again, “I never thought you were a monster, not like everyone says. You’re just like the thestrals, I think. You’re surrounded by death, but you aren’t letting it in anymore. Good for you.” Her light voice drifted off despite the shocked look on Gaara’s face. “It really was very nice of you to help like that.”

 

“Gaara used to be a ‘shinobi’ where he came from. I think that’s what they do, help people and stuff; like an auror.” Draco piped in, dismissing the girl’s praise, bored of standing off to the side.

 

“I’d love to talk to you some more, Gaara, only, I have to go to my lesson now. They don’t much like it when I’m late.” That Gaara had remained silent throughout the encounter seemed lost on the lunatic who now seemed to be focussing on his head. “You know, you have very nice hair and a very nice scar. I hope you’ve found it.” Luna twirled around and began to walk off, zigzagging along her way, not bothering to put her shoes on just yet.

 

Draco wondered what she meant about Gaara finding ‘it’, and Gaara wondered how the headmaster let so many mentally unstable people into one school.

 

The pair walked off soon after Luna’s departure, Draco enumerating his experiences of being the Slytherin house Seeker in Quidditch, a position some coveted highly, a position that Gaara didn’t care about. Now, if only he had a way of telling Draco this, as they made their way in the general direction of their next lesson, transfiguration.

 

\-----------------------------

 

It had been a long while since Gaara’s muscles had ached from exertion. Not since he had arrived in this world had he worked himself hard enough to make his back and his legs throb with a satisfyingly burning pain. A small solace to him, other than the obvious satisfaction of a day’s training making him stronger, was the pain Draco was certain to be in. It had, after all, been the unfit Slytherin’s suggestion that they do something else, rather than practicing spellwork that early Saturday morn; though, Draco had probably been thinking of something more like sleeping in until nine or ten and then spending the day playing their altered Quidditch variant, maybe even invite some others to join in. Instead, Gaara had informed his friend that they would be ‘training’ that day. Draco had had no idea what to expect from that one word, but he would know forever more that it meant _pain_.

 

The work-out was no Gai routine, Gaara still having not managed to pull off the handstand-around-the-village shtick, but the shinobi-worthy exercises were more than draining for the layabout that was Draco. Suffice to say, Draco wasn’t going to be learning taijutsu or long distance running any time this millennium. Still, to the sloth’s credit, he did try to keep up with Gaara as he was led on a ten mile jog. It would have been a sprint, but Gaara was fairly sure Draco wouldn’t make it half a mile before collapsing at that rate. He lasted a full two miles at a jogging pace.

 

So, after half a day training and the other half being cursed by his roommate, Gaara was more than happy to slip into the luxurious baths he had not known existed until now. Gaara did know full well that the baths were for prefects only, being situated in the prefects’ bathroom in fact, but threatening a handful of older teenage civilians into quickly exiting the baths was a small cost. This was one of the many things he missed about home, baths. Having had to make do with showers, or without at times, the feeling of the heavenly hot water around him was relaxing bliss. Or, it was, until he heard someone else enter the bathing area. Gaara wasn’t all too worried about his peace being disrupted for long, knowing that there was only one person in the entire castle who wouldn’t run from him in fear. It was just Gaara’s luck that that one person was now taking his bath after a long and hard day of working-out with his sadistic roommate. It turned out that Gaara wasn’t the only one willing to threaten the prefects when need be.

 

“Oh,” Draco, in just his bathing towel, looked rightfully shocked to see his roommate sitting in the hottest area of the bath after having disappeared earlier on without explanation. Draco hadn’t been nearly as concerned this time because the red-head had taken his gourd with him, which was now propped up against a sink nearby.

 

Gaara closed his eyes, too relaxed to care and not wanting to encourage a conversation when he was trying to sink into a tranquil coma. Draco, over his initial surprise, entered the bath too, sitting down and staying as quiet as a murderer could hope for. All would be well for Gaara, were it not for the feeling of having intent eyes on him. Sighing a little, Gaara cracked open an eye and spotted that Draco was indeed staring at him with an inappropriate intensity for the time and place. With the look lingering longer than he considered necessary, Gaara opened his eyes fully and raised an (invisible) eyebrow, bemused, waiting for an adequate answer for Draco’s examination of his torso and face.

 

A cursory glance at Gaara’s questioning face was all it took for Draco to blush terribly and stutter an apology before explaining, “S-sorry, it’s just... that mark on your stomach, and all those scars...” Gaara looked down, seeing the demon seal prominently set upon his belly and the myriad of scars that were usually covered up by his sand armour. It surprised the heavily worn boy that it had taken this long for his friend to see him like this, having lived in such close proximity for the past month. It was also unfortunate. The scars were easy to explain, a good few of them having appeared since his adventure in this world had begun, but the seal was another matter entirely. The only reason it was showing at all was because Gaara had been using his chakra to rest his arms on top of the water’s surface. Luckily, Gaara had a kind of defence for times like these that could deflect any follow-up questions; he turned his head and pretended he hadn’t heard. He was but a poor mute boy.

 

“What is it, the... mark?”

 

Gaara closed his eyes again and sunk down a little in the water.

 

“Gaara...” Draco, knowing he was being ignored whilst he tried to breach that topic, decided to drop it. The roommates soaked for a good long while, only coming out of their trances to fling a glare or a threat at one of those presumptuous prefects trying to access their own baths. The nerve of some people.

 

When Gaara had had enough, his skin beginning to prune in the most uncomfortable way, he stood and walked out of the baths without even a backward glance to Draco. The scarred teen slipped into the changing room, dumped his bathing towel and dried himself before redressing and suppressing the fox-like urge to prank Draco, seeing as his clothes were so helplessly laid out. Restraint was Gaara’s middle name as of recent months, and the pat on the back from his best friend back in Konoha would only confound his shame if said friend were to learn of his acting on his mischievous impulses. Sparing the potential prank one more nervous glance, Gaara moved onwards towards his dorm room so that he could meditate for a little while without the distraction of his roommate’s presence, and do some of his mountainous homework over the course of the night. He wasn’t very tired anyway.

 

\-----------------------------

 

“And so Garb’l-e-Nark von Humpershpeil, son of the famous Goblin industrialist Orgag the Mechanical, not to be confused with Organic the Vegetarian, and the witch Herga the Disquieting, settled the second-ever peace treaty of its kind between the Goblins and the Wizard’s Coalition in 1535 caused by the First Great Carpet Dispute. Garb’l-e-Nark is also notable for his contributions to the field of Goblin-Centaur economics relating to inheritance tax allowances. This fascinating life of economic development was facilitated by the Minister for Magic at the time, who is now believed to have been von Humpershpeil in disguise, who allowed Garb’l-e-Nark unlimited access to the Centaurs as well as signing into law the economic mandates required for such a risky fiscal move. However, in 1530, at the start of the First Great Carpet Dispute, the then Minister for Magic, Kran-e-L’Brag was ousted from office when many questioned his building a large statue of his long-time colleague von Humpershpeil. This statue was later melted down to make bed frames.”

 

The bored senseless red-head had seldom wanted to exorcise a spirit as much as Professor Binns, even Shukaku was... Well, Cuthbert Binns was still the second worst teacher Gaara was forced to endure. At least the other students were able to fall asleep to avoid the horror of two hours listening to the doddering old spook reciting the most dry and useless history ever recorded, Gaara, meanwhile, was an insomniac who had trouble enough sleeping at night. He was doomed. Occasionally Gaara would fire off a small bullet of sand at the dead teacher’s head, only for it to fly on through untouched and explode softly against the far wall before sloping back to Gaara for the next shot. Even with this excitement, unnoticed by all of the other snoozing students, didn’t help Gaara. He meditated for hours on end and yet this lesson seemed to last forever more.

 

There was only one other student who was awake and, by the looks of her notebook, this was by choice. Every time Hermione saw another projectile pass through the oblivious Binns’ head, she turned to glare at Gaara, to his disinterest. She had tried a few times to wake either Harry or Ron, so that they too could witness the suspect doing something nefarious, but both of them only woke to check the clock and, at seeing the lesson as still far from over, resumed ignoring their dear friend.

 

Draco _had tried_ to stay awake, and lasted longer than most, but that only amounted to paying attention for fifteen minutes into the lecture before dropping his head. He hadn’t even been writing the lecture notes he was supposed to. Everyone knew you got your notes either from a nerd like Granger (Draco had been saddened to find, after their first History of Magic lesson of the year, that his studious friend Gaara hadn’t taken any notes at all) or you worked from one of the countless History text books from the library. What Draco had written, before the soft lullaby of the elderly-looking ghost at the front of the room got to him, was a list of the strange things he’d noticed about Gaara. He’d shielded his book with his arm and went to sleep on top of it to prevent Gaara from rumbling him, and he’d only noted the really strange things about Gaara otherwise the only apt description of his strange attributes would be simply ‘Gaara’, nevertheless, it confused Draco when he looked over these notes later on. There just seemed to be something missing.

 

_‘Gaara (first name or last?). Full name Sabaku no Gaara (apparently):_

  1. _He can’t talk (unless he clones himself)_
  2. _Foreign (from where?)_
  3. _Red-hair (too dark)_
  4. _The scars_
  5. _That mark on his chest (another tattoo?)_
  6. _Tattoo on his forehead_
  7. _He doesn’t sleep every night_
  8. _His disappearing (during a full moon!)_
  9. _His sand power and the container thing_
  10. _Whatever a ‘shinobi’ is_
  11. _His personality._
  12. _He doesn’t know about the Wizarding world_
  13. _He didn’t know about Quidditch!_
  14. _He didn’t know basic magic (still doesn’t...)_
  15. _Magic doesn’t work properly_
  16. _Is he a pureblood? Or even a wizard?’_



Draco would have been very concerned with Gaara’s disappearing during a full moon, a fact he’d noticed the next day, had he not remembered that the first night back at Hogwarts had been a full moon, albeit cloudy, and he would have noticed if Gaara had turned into a murderous monster. And werewolves weren’t affected that drastically by the weather on the night of their transformation. Everyone knows that. Except Potter and Weasley...

 

Still, whatever was missing was something big, the platinum blond was sure of that much. He just wished he could just outright ask Gaara what it was, but nothing was ever that simple with his fellow outcast. Half the time he would follow Draco absentmindedly and nod whenever an opinion was asked of him, like any good friend would, and other times he would be distant and standoffish, as if Draco’s very existence annoyed him. The noble Malfoy heir normally would dismiss anyone who acted like this, he liked to know where he stood with people, but Gaara was different to Draco because he was everything Draco wasn’t. All the others around Draco, even his old so-called friends, had been cowardly blood purists who had no power on their own. It sickened Draco now, and he wanted to change, even if he was forced to associate with moderate Slytherins like Tracey Davis and Roy Norbel while he shunned his old (not friends) acquaintances like Blaise Zabini, who now went out of his way to usurp Draco’s old place at the head of the pack, and Crabbe & Goyle, who were more afraid of him than ever before...for some reason. Even Pansy had forsaken him, and she’d been so pretty. Now she only scoffed at him if he came within ten feet of her.

 

The heir dreaded what his father would say, or worse, what his father would do. He dreaded it so much that he hadn’t opened any mail in nearly two weeks. Arguably, that had been the bigger mistake, as now his mother would be worrying and, from the rapidly growing pile of letters on his bedroom desk, getting progressively angrier. If Lucius was his biggest fear, his mother was a close second. Second only because she never hit him, though if ever she were to, this might well be it. What was worse was that Draco knew there was at least one howler from his mother waiting in the pile, and because his mother was prone to using plainly coloured envelopes for hers, he wouldn’t know which was hers until he opened it. Mrs Malfoy had also disabled the exploding charm function of the letter so that Draco could open it when he was good and ready rather than in the company of all of his friends and classmates. It just wouldn’t do to show such overt emotions in front of his peers, after all. Still, despite that no immediate threat was being posed by his waiting to open his howler and read the rest of his post, Draco still held out hope that he would be struck by a stray blasting hex or tonne of sand so that he could enjoy a blissful coma for a week or two instead of the impending threat of a visit from his father (and possibly his mother as well).

 

Frankly, Draco wasn’t sure which scared him more about such a visit, his father and mother’s anger at him, or their reaction to his new (best (only)) friend.

 

\-----------------------------

 

Where to start...

 

Mistake number 1: Letting Gaara practice the wand movements with his actual wand.

Mistake number 2: Offering to practice against Gaara, seeing as he had improved so much and would be less likely to accidentally mess up the spell.

Mistake number 3: Not ducking.

 

Lupin, a man with a history of more regrets than hot meals, looked back at the last half hour he had spent on the floor of his classroom clutching his stomach because the tickling hex Gaara had sent at him had hit him so hard he had almost lost his breakfast, and he sighed. The attacker had, in either shame or disinterest, gone to the back of the room to sit on his own whilst the rest of the students continued with their own practices. The closeted werewolf would have liked to have thought that Gaara was so ashamed at his having hurt Lupin that he had to take a moment to sit on his own and worry senselessly about whether his precious teacher was alright. He would have liked to believe that. What he had seen, through a pain-filled haze, was Gaara hit him with the curse, wait until he groaned in pain, and at seeing his professor was not dead, gone to the back of the room where he then pulled out a large book and began to read. He hadn’t glanced up since a stray spell impacted his sand shield, not even to check on his dear friend’s fragile health; and that was how he liked to think of Gaara, a friend, a student and an attempted murderer.

 

When he regained his senses, the walking wounded stumbled back to his desk and fished a small letter out of his drawer, which he had hidden in a magical compartment he himself had created specially. The letter in question was unassuming and held only a single sheet of parchment, and yet would certainly be enough, if discovered by the wrong individual with the right information, to land him with a very lengthy stay in Azkaban prison. Luckily, there were only a handful of people alive that had the right information that could incriminate him with the letter, so he held no reluctance in pulling it out in the middle of his class of third-year students, in which Harry Potter was now standing (over the giggling form of his friend Ron who was trying to undo the tickling hex that had been cast upon him). Lupin took his quill and scribbled a little note at the bottom of the letter he had been sent, before slipping it back into the envelope and sliding that into a small book called Harmless Hexes and their Makers.

 

“I think you might find this book particularly interesting, Gaara,” Lupin handed the thin book to the questioning boy. “A friend of mine recommended it to me.” Gaara nodded and slipped the book into his old leather satchel to read later. Part of the off-worlder really hoped it wasn’t just the beginner’s spell book and a not-so-subtle hint to practice more on his own from the wounded practice dummy who was now limping back to sit at his desk and nurse his poor stomach.

 

Draco, who hadn’t missed the exchange, ducked under the hex that was sent his way and sent one right back. Several weeks ago, had one of his acquaintances been given such a book from a professor like Lupin, he would have been livid at the insinuation of incompetence and immediately sent a letter to his father to have such a professor sacked. Now, however, he could neither send a letter to his father nor could he blame Lupin when he himself had been on the receiving end of far too many of Gaara’s ridiculous spells. Frankly, he was half tempted to recommend Gaara be barred from such practices himself, but he couldn’t insult his friend like that. Unless they were partnered together again, then it was a matter of survival.

 

The lesson ended and the students exited the classroom, all keeping an even greater distance between them and Gaara than before to avoid his immense spell-casting abilities. Despite all of the rumours of Gaara’s inability to perform even the simplest of spells properly, when the class saw a third year incapacitate their teacher effortlessly with a tickling hex, they couldn’t help but be awed by that power. Well, the Slytherins were awed, the Gryffindors were mostly angry by the attack on the kind man. Harry was more than bemused. He was really starting to like Lupin, which was natural seeing as both previous Defence teachers had been either incompetent and possessed by his arch-nemesis, or incompetent and really annoying. Then there was Lupin’s apparent friendship with his father, which he had been meaning to talk to the man about sometime soon. All in all, Gaara seemed worse than even Draco now.

 

And that was another odd thing that all three of the Trio had noticed and/or mentioned, that Draco Malfoy, reputed git, was now slightly less gittish. Not to the extent that he wasn’t a foul-mouthed, snobbish, weak little blood-puritan, but he hadn’t cornered Harry to attack him, verbally or magically, in weeks. It was refreshing. That, along with Snape’s attentions being drawn elsewhere, was adding up to a pretty good year for him. Now, if only there wasn’t an infamous mass-murderer on the loose looking to kill him in the name of the even worse Dark Lord who was still out there somewhere, and the swarm of Dementors who had a tendency to attack students, if the episode on the train was any indication.

 

Harry didn’t get a chance to confront Gaara for his having attacked Lupin unprovoked, with his two trusty friends backing him up, as both Gaara and his shadow, Draco, had disappeared in the rush of exiting students. Harry couldn’t even take the opportunity to talk to Lupin about his parents because he had apparently limped away to the Madam Pomfrey while no one was looking. All in all, Harry considered this a battle lost.

 

Meanwhile, Gaara and Draco were walking back to their common room, Defence having been the last lesson of the day, and both were in quiet contemplation. After they passed a pair of snickering fifth years, who darted up the stairs past them, Draco said offhandedly, “Gaara, have you ever thought about pretending to be a squib?”

 

He was promptly ignored.

 

When they arrived at the Slytherin common room, as the secret door swung outwards to allow them entrance, an intense wave of heated air hit them dead on, almost knocking Draco off his feet. They walked into the usually cool room to find it hotter than a sauna and devoid of people bar one or two of the liberals lounging around in just a shirt and shorts drinking iced drinks.

 

Draco stomped up to one of the first years who seemed to be the only other fully dressed Slytherin there, and highly uncomfortable for it, “What’s going on here?”

 

“I-I don’t know. It just got really hot, like, in the last few minutes. Jack’s gone to get professor Snape.”

 

Draco didn’t know who Jack was, and he didn’t care, he wouldn’t be kicked out of his own dormitory over something like this. Besides, there was a chance that Gaara would take his electing to leave the dorm as a signal he wanted extra time ‘training’. The pureblood didn’t care if the house was set on fire, he wouldn’t be subjected to that torture lightly. Speaking of his sadistic friend, Gaara seem to be perfectly happy stood in the heat, whilst Draco was sweating a disgusting bucket-load. It would make sense, Draco thought, if Gaara came from a desert like one of the ones in Egypt. He had all of that sand and didn’t know anything about British wizarding culture.

 

Gaara walked to their room and Draco followed, wanting to ask about Gaara’s home again. Maybe if he guessed right Gaara would tell him. It couldn’t hurt to try.

 

Gaara was loving the heat, so like his own home, if a little more humid. He sauntered back to his room and thanked whatever accident or fault in the heating system that had delivered such lovely weather. He was a desert dweller and the weather in this world right now was closer to that of Snow. He was glad to find his room was just as hot as the rest of Slytherin but then Draco moved to the window to let the cold back in. Thinking fast, Gaara called out his sand and created a spherical shield of sand like he so often did, except, this one was formed around Draco, trapping him inside along with the heat. The Jinchūriki needed some privacy to check through the book Lupin had given him, so he figured Draco could suffer the heat for a few minutes.

 

Draco was in an oven of sand. He was going to kill Gaara.

 

The Bijū container flipped through the tome and was glad to find a letter inside the pages, and not just painfully simple spell theory. The letter was addressed to him, but had ‘ ~~Moony~~ ’ written above it, scribbled out, presumably this letter was just being forwarded to him. Gaara knew three people in this world well enough to receive a letter from: one was forwarding it to him, one was trapped in a boiling hot torture chamber, so that just left his favourite escaped convict (in this world). Pulling out the parchment, he read the messy scrawl:

 

_‘ ~~Moony,~~_

_Gaara,_

_I’m so happy to hear Prongs Jr. is doing well. He’s making his godfather so proud. He’s following in Prongs’ hoofsteps for sure. I knew you’d do a great job. Also, my condolences about Lily’s terrible spells. I’m sure he’ll get better with practice, but at least he’s fighting in his own way for the greater good. I hope he keeps fighting for the light, converting little Death Eaters. Getting a Malfoy to pull his head out of his arse long enough to smell the daisies is an achievement worth commending._

_You or Lily should visit soon because I’m really bored sitting here on my own. The Dementors didn’t drive me insane, no matter what you or any trained medi-witch may say, but this boredom might just do it. Besides, it’s been so long since I entertained company, and I would relish the challenge of cooking a full roast dinner again._

_Moony, if you don’t act on Wormtail soon, I will. I can’t wait much longer._

_Yours,_

_Padfoot’_

 

At the bottom of the page, in Lupin’s handwriting, it read:

 

_‘Lily,_

_I would be more than happy to give you some one-to-one help outside of class, to improve your spellcasting, you seem to have had trouble with them. When you are done reading this, burn the note and dispose of the ashes. If you would like the extra lessons, tell me you need help in your next lesson._

_Moony’_

 

Gaara wished he knew a violent Katon justu, because simply casting this note into a regular fire would not suffice to quell Gaara’s anger at being called Lily again and again. It was bad enough that his ineptitude in magic had been raised so many times, Gaara was tempted to accept Lupin’s request just to shoot spells at the man. What stopped him was the knowledge that what the note said was true, the spellcasting part. He would still need to get retribution for the nickname, and he excelled at retribution like few others.

 

The matter of Pettigrew, on the other hand, was problematic. Gaara had yet to see the man-turned-rat and that was the problem. He would have no problem acquiring the rat once he was within sight, his sand being handy like that, but the thing had apparently been hiding out somewhere. The proud shinobi would be damned if were to allow himself to sink as low as to spend his days searching for a hidden pet. He’d heard Konoha shinobi joking about having had to catch a cat as Gennin (honestly, who would assign trained ninja to track a pet down...), so he’d be the butt of everyone else’s jokes if he actively searched for the rat. And it was Sirius’ problem to deal with, being framed and all. He’d help if he could, but he wouldn’t make it his life mission to fulfil someone else’s revenge. There was that... and he’d tried in the Gryffindor common room one day, having snuck out of his lesson for a little while, and couldn’t find the little rodent. It hadn’t been on the Weasley boy and it hadn’t been in their room so he was stuck for ideas on where it could be hiding. But other than that, it was in ideological opposition to him to search for Pettigrew.

 

Gaara went back to the common room and cast the letter into the fire along with some old homework he’d mixed in. The foreigner still didn’t quite understand the limitations of magic, but he thought such a precaution should stop anyone from reconstituting the letter from the ashes, and he’d scribbled all over the sheet before hand and ripped it up as well. After he was done watching the paper disintegrate he shifted the ashes around to mix them up and turned around. Snape was standing in the centre of the room looking almost as angry as the other day, but this time he seemed to be focussing on the caretaker. Apparently someone had jinxed the heating for the dormitory and it couldn’t be undone for another twenty-four hours. They couldn’t even use magic to cool the room down because the castle prevented such spells to prevent pranks...

 

Moving swiftly around the room, avoiding Snape at all costs, the borderline delinquent was about to vacate the room when he remembered what he had done to Draco a few minutes before. As Snape began to turn towards the entrance he was now occupying, Gaara considered leaving Draco there for an hour or so, in the baking heat with possibly limited oxygen, seething with anger. With slumped shoulders at his own reluctance to let people die, even for noble causes like avoiding Snape, Gaara descended back down the marble steps to return to his room and free Draco and possibly revive him or hide his body.

 

“Move out of my way, freak!” Gaara wasn’t in his way, clearly standing to the side of the staircase to avoid trouble, but irrelevant facts like that were hardly important when Snape was angry. “Don’t you have someone’s life to make miserable? Or are you finally going to put some effort into learning so you don’t remain an incompetent waste of magical power worse than Potter? You disgust me.”

 

Thinking his options through, all too briefly hindsight offered, Gaara drew his leg back and kicked Snape’s own from under him causing the potions master to fall flat on his face. The attacker continued on his way promptly, wishing to avoid whatever scathing remark or painful spell Snape would wish to cast his way. As he turned a corner, something that might have been a blasting curse hit the wall leaving a sizable dent. Gaara decided he was probably lucky to be banned from Potions for the foreseeable future as he would be in definite danger if he attended.

 

Back at his room, he recalled his sand back into his calabash gourd and considered whether an apology written down was worth the same as one spoken directly to the injured party. Draco, down to his underwear, sweating and chest heaving laboriously, laid out on his back looking dazed, could only summon the energy to turn his head and flash a contemptuous look before turning back to the ceiling and trying to regain his breath. The merciless weapon stepped over Draco and opened a window, walked back to the door and turned to the half-dead Malfoy and gave a short bow before exiting the cooling room.

 

So, he would now have to avoid Snape AND Draco, as well as keeping a reasonable distance between himself and the rest of the student body.

 

He meant well, but sometimes the best intentions will leave your best friend on the floor trying to stay conscious after being partway roasted.

 

During dinner, Gaara snuck down into their room, having waited for this brief absence, and left a note to Draco expressing his apologies and his intention to spend the night elsewhere (so that he wasn’t smothered in his sleep (not that Shukaku would allow that)). He ended up spending the night in a classroom, sleeping on a soft bed of sand with his protective shield set around him. It frightened the caretaker, doing his nightly rounds, in no small measure to find the ridiculously pale boy sleeping in a classroom with floating clouds of sand hovering around him. The rat that tried to sneak in during the night, sometime after that, trying to avoid Mrs Norris, was even more scared and considered going back his ‘owner’ to avoid whatever Dumbledore had let into the school this time.

 

Deciding to brave the assuredly cold relations he would need to endure at breakfast, Gaara decided to take his figurative punishment and endure Draco’s ire, the next day. Frankly, Gaara thought sleeping on his sand all night, or the few hours he was actually able to sleep, was punishment enough. He could have stayed up, but he had no books to read and it was too cold outside to practice. Draco, unsurprisingly, was more than irritated; he shot more than a few spells under the table at the Jinchūriki, though Gaara was unaware of this at the time because his sand acted automatically out of sight and out of mind. By the time lessons rolled around, Draco was happy to sit at the other side of the room to avoid Gaara who he considered to be little more than an enemy at this point. Gaara had knocked him out, kept secrets from him, sent dangerous spells his way, almost strangled him, alienated him from his peers and family, and now he’d almost killed him again. And he _still_ hadn’t opened his parents’ letters. If he didn’t soon then he probably go back into Gaara’s sand chamber willingly.

 

In all but one lesson, Gaara was saddened by Draco’s sudden distance but couldn’t blame his friend. He hadn’t really mastered the whole _socialising_ thing yet and, to him, encasing a boy in a cocoon of sand wasn’t all that bad, really. He’d have to work on that if Draco ever forgave him. Or if he ever got home and made friends there. On the other hand, the one lesson he wasn’t so sad to be alone in was DADA, and that was because he had to swallow his pride and ask Lupin for his help, which certainly didn’t need witnesses. What also required no witnesses was when Gaara snatched Lupin’s wand from the man’s pocket with the intention of withholding it until their lesson in two day’s time, after curfew. It was petty revenge, but it was the best he could come up with on the spot.

 

Now, Lupin wouldn’t usually ask a student to break the rules, but Gaara didn’t really fall into any categories, much less the rule-abiding kind. However, his expectation of Gaara’s rule breaking didn’t reach to wand stealing so he was more than a little worried when he couldn’t find it where he was certain he’d left it. He spent the remainder of the day hoping desperately that no situation would arise that needed his wand. It was humiliating for a wizard his age to lose his wand, what’s more, a teacher of his subject losing his wand. He’d have to make sure Sirius never found out. On the second day, Lupin began to try and whittle down the list of potential suspects of who could have stolen his precious wand, as, by that point, he came to the conclusion that theft was the only way he could have lost it. There was Snape at the top of the list, then the Weasley twins, then the collective of Slytherins who hated him for not being a pureblood and not discriminating against the muggleborns. Really, now that he thought about it, the only people he knew hadn’t taken it were McGonagall, Dumbledore, Harry and Gaara; the people he trusted. Further thought brought the werewolf to the possibility that Sirius might have been involved, but that was derailed as Sirius hadn’t been anywhere near him when he lost it, but there was always a small part of Lupin that would immediately look in Padfoot’s direction when something went awry. It was a survival instinct.

 

Whilst the man worried about his reliable wand, Gaara made his way out into the woods carrying a large slab of unidentified meat he’d stolen from the kitchens. He hadn’t ever seen a house elf before and he hoped he never had to see one again. Apparently the odd little slaves were human enough to instinctively fear his presence, going so far as to hide when he came near, and animal enough to venture towards him intermittently before running away again. With over fifty elves running to and from him with looks of fear and curiosity in their oversized eyes, the ordeal wasn’t pleasant. Then the look of terror when he told them he was taking one of the big slabs of meat from fridge. They all screamed and tried to escape, some even teleporting away. He might have licked his lips when he looked at the meat, but that was just because he hadn’t eaten very much for breakfast, trying to avoid Draco’s furious eyes and all.

 

The weather outside was cold but dry, remedied by a few extra layers, and Gaara was supposed to be in the library doing self-study to bring his potions abilities up to the standard where it would be safe enough to let him back into the classroom, where the rest of his year group currently were. The walking disaster area didn’t think he would be safe in the vicinity of Severus Snape for some time, potions abilities or none. His free time and boredom with rereading the same Potions textbooks was what led him to making this impromptu trek back into the Dark Forest again. And though this was certainly the most leisurely stroll he’d taken into the woods thus far, it wasn’t without minor problems, as a skulk of foxes had taken a fervent interest in the meat he was carrying. The ravenous pests were persistent enough to force him into using _shunshin_ to escape. Usually he would have fed a hungry family of animals, but ever since the Suna-Konoha war, he’d bore a small grudge against foxes, giant or normal.

 

With the use of the teleportation technique, he arrived at his destination, heralded by the happy barks of three dog-heads that had apparently smelt him coming. He didn’t know why they were excited to see him, after having met him once; but then, they might have just smelt the giant piece of meat he was carrying with him. Gaara had thought about getting some dog biscuits for them instead, but they seemed woefully inadequate to give to a dog (dogs?) that size.

 

While Gaara was off feeding and playing with a stray dog, Draco was sat in Potions trying to avoid Snape’s wrath as the grumpy bat limped around the room almost snarling at his students one by one. Harry was unhappy to note that Snape was centring his disdain on him again, which wasn’t a particularly happy return.

 

Now, Draco was still more annoyed than Professor McGonagall when offered catnip by drunk seventh years, but he was also now terribly lonely seeing as his old friends had still deserted him and now Gaara was (rightfully) avoiding him. He was sat on his own at the back of the Potions room, wallowing in self-pity for his lonely state for over an hour. He glanced across the dim room to his housemates, the ones he didn’t now hate for their betrayal and/or bigotry, and came to a decision that he wanted them back, his friends and status as unofficial head of the house (in his eyes only). Even if it would be so much harder to achieve now that he couldn’t bring himself to hate the muggleborns (for their blood purity at least) and because of his irrevocable link to Gaara despite their current disagreement on how to treat living creatures, especially living creatures they are currently rooming with; he would regain what he’d lost.

 

That situation with Gaara would need to be dealt with at some point, too, and recently he’d been hankering for some mischief. Once upon a time, when he was feeling the need to cause trouble, he’d probably insult Potter or his friends to get a rise out of them or cause trouble for a teacher by complaining to his father, now, however, he wanted something a little less antagonistic and little more juvenile. He’d have to keep check on this desire lest he turn into another Weasley twin. The heat had been dreadful even after he got out of the Sand-ball of Death and everyone knew that a prank against the noble house of Slytherin was undoubtedly the work of those two ginger menaces.

 

Draco’s retribution against the other, single, red-head who’d wronged him would have to wait a little while as he wanted to go flying with his team and had just conjured up a plan on how to achieve that and make the Weasleys pay for their insult. It would also make Potter angry, which was always a bonus.

 

\-----------------------------

 

“The key’s not working.”

 

“What?”

 

“Yeah, what do you mean ‘the key’s not working’?”

 

“I’m saying it’s not working. It won’t fit in the lock.”

 

“Rubbish, pass it here, I’ll try it.”

 

“Be my guest.”

 

“...the key’s not working.”

 

“I told you so.”

 

“Well why’s it not working, then?”

 

Harry watched as Fred or George tried to open the broom closet where all of the Gryffindor Quidditch supplies were held, including their brooms, only for their key to once again fail. It didn’t make sense, it was definitely the same key and no one could change the locks without unlocking it, and these locks were meant to be spell-proof for all intents and purposes. It was so not fair. Harry had been waiting patiently to go out and practice, enduring all of the week’s indignities and now his one safe haven was being taken from him. If they didn’t get this sorted soon enough, Slytherin would be sure to slither in and take the practice slot and Gryffindor would have to wait until next week for another, maybe even later. They could only hope that Slytherin didn’t find out about this.

 

\-----------------------------

 

“Flint.”

 

“What is it, Draco?” The upperclassman asked testily, even using the boy’s first name as a mark of disrespect after recent events.

 

“Get the team together.”

 

“Where do you get off telling me what to do?” The buck-tooth boy sat up straighter on the Great Hall bench as his arm twitched eagerly towards his wand.

 

“The Gryffindorks won’t be making it to their practice on time today so we’ll steal the slot and get some much needed practice. I’d have thought you of all people would want to take this last chance to best Wood in the House Cup.”

 

“How do you know they won’t make it to practice?” A raised eyebrow was all the sign of hope that Flint would share with Draco, but his fingers were no longer itching to grasp his wand to teach his House Seeker a lesson, so the boy took it as a good sign.

 

“I’ve ensured it in the proper, Slytherin, way, of course. It’s all ours if we act soon.”

 

A large yellow-toothed smile spread across his face, “I knew there was still hope for you, Malfoy. Go get Higgs and Pucey from the common room.”

 

Without another word, Draco moved on, knowing he was being shown some (very) rare kindness from the captain as Adrian and Terence were the only two players on the team that wouldn’t hex him if he tried to talk to them outside of practice these days. Though Terence wouldn’t be too happy to see him either, considering he stole his spot as Seeker last year and he’d never quite forgiven Draco for it. It didn’t escape Draco’s notice that Flint had been even kinder by allowing him the chance to regain some favour in this way. It wasn’t beyond the captain to sabotage his attempt at redemption, at the cost of extra practice time, if it meant causing someone suffering. Marcus Flint had never even really cared for winning in Quidditch, he was more about the sadistic joy of watching Gryffindor’s falling to the ground.

 

Luckily, both of the fairest players on the team, other than himself, were quick to follow once he explained what was going on. Draco was pointedly fair when playing (most of the time) because he didn’t have to cheat to win, except when he was facing Potter, but his pride still wouldn’t let him cheat against the Gryffindors, despite the scathing looks he had received from his teammates the few times they had lost to Gryffindor. By the time Draco, Pucey and Higgs got onto the field, the rest of the team had arrived and were laughing among themselves at their having stolen a practice spot. The elation hit a peak when they spotted the Gryffindors arrive without their brooms and then leave swiftly again when they saw who had profited from their trouble.

 

As the team mounted their brooms, all in high spirits, Draco did a swift circuit of the field and threw the new key to the Gryffindor broom closet out into the fields surrounding the stadium. He figured it would take at least another hour until they bothered checking with Filch, who would tell them a small blonde ‘Gryffindor brat’ had asked for the locks to be changed because they’d lost the keys. Now that he’d gotten rid of the evidence, Draco laughed at the image of Filch refusing to change the locks a second time in one day and threatening them with barbaric punishments for wasting his time.

 

Flint announced that he wanted all of the positions practicing together, including substitutes, for the hour. This was the captain’s not-so-subtle hint that he would be shifting the starting line-up if the regulars disappointed him. It was also Flint’s way of telling Draco in particular that his ticket onto the team, the Nimbus 2001s, was now expired and he’d have to earn his keep to remain. And from the big smile of Higgs’ face, Draco wasn’t the only one to pick up on this. The balls were released and everyone began.

 

Out in the stands, Gaara watched the Golden Snitch race around under everyone’s noses. It often amazed the shinobi, how many of his ninja-honed skills were useful in wizarding situations. For instance, along with the instincts developed to track fast moving shiny objects (typically pointy weapons), Gaara was also well versed in keeping secrets, which now helped him to avoid drawing his housemates’ attention. If his house found out that he could see the Snitch at any given time, they’d undoubtedly pester him into joining the team. And he just couldn’t do that. Playing games was beneath him, and he would essentially be taking Draco’s spot, but above all he would never jump onto one of those flimsy pieces of wood and fly hundreds of feet into the air. Not for a game. Not in this lifetime.

 

Meanwhile, both Draco and Terrence were still in their starting positions, trying to catch a glimpse of gold. Draco scanned everywhere he could, occasionally glancing back to his opponent to see if he had spotted anything. Then, suddenly, Terrence flew downwards in a burst of speed that left Draco stunned momentarily before following him. Now that they were both following the same path, Draco saw the Snitch flying out near the base of one of the stands and tried to catch up to his counterpart who was still a ways in front of him. Pushing forward to his top speed, Draco still wasn’t head to head with Higgs. The Snitch didn’t sit idle either, flying up to the top of the stands and darting out into the centre of the pitch, among the other players, all the while being chased by both Malfoy and Higgs.

 

While Higgs was definitely the superior spotter, Draco was the better flyer of the two, and by the time the pair were in the middle of the pitch, Draco had pulled out in front and was not losing his lead any time soon. Then came the Bludgers; Derrick and Bole had been beating them back and forth until now, but as Malfoy came into sight, an opportunity to get rid of a budding blood traitor also appeared. The two then set their sights on knocking their younger seeker off of his broom. So, Draco had to stay ahead of Terrence, chase the Snitch and avoid the barrage of bludgers that he noticed were only being hit towards him. But still he didn’t falter, even when he felt a Bludger brush the top of his arm, perilously close to breaking his arm like a certain inferior Gryffindor seeker.

 

The Snitch began to fly towards the goal posts that Flint was milling around, watching his team practice and cheat. Flint didn’t see the Snitch, so when he saw who he had believed to be his weaker Seeker, flying towards him at top speed, with Higgs following quite a distance behind, he was a little shocked, to put it mildly. He’d been glancing towards his Seekers all practice and Draco was flying better than he had ever before. Whether that was because he was maturing into a teenager, or because he had been practicing during the summer (or all of the above plus regular workouts with a sadistic, fitness obsessed roommate), Flint didn’t know but either way he was doing much better than Higgs, who was lagging so severely he would rather lose both Seekers and recruit an entirely new one than bring back his old seeker. It seemed that Terrence had been spending the last year wallowing, or doing his schoolwork, and hadn’t been practicing at all.

 

All who saw it were amazed when they witnessed Draco Malfoy, the boy who had had his father pay his way onto the team, presumably following the Snitch, slip off his broom going at top speed and follow the black Nimbus 2001 through the Quidditch Hoop and then pull himself back on to his broom before spiralling around the base of the hoop. Many jaws were slack as Draco landed on the ground and held up the Snitch along with a supremely smug look.

 

Well, he wasn’t going to be cut from the team any time soon and Gaara would never, ever know that his hellish training over the last few weeks had helped him. Never!

 

Gaara watched and smiled as several other team members landed around Draco and stiffly complimented him. He would have to continue those little exercise routines with Draco. Who knows, maybe one day he could pass for physically fit, rather than the lazy aristocrat he was before.

 

Back on the field, most of the players hopped back on their brooms and resumed practice after they had given their obligatory congratulations. However, Adrian Pucey stayed on the ground to discuss Draco’s performance with enthusiasm seldom seen inside Slytherin house. Even Miles Bletchley stayed around to talk to Draco, who was ecstatic to have people to talk to again, and even better was that they talked back. The rest of the practice was as exhilarating as the first half, and the satisfaction that came from mocking the Gryffindor team about the loss of their much needed practice time was brilliant as ever. Even better, still, when they tried to pin the blame for the loss of their practice slot on Draco only for Flint and the rest of the team to back him up.

 

And then things escalated when passing Gryffindors and Slytherins started to argue about which side were the liars. Soon enough McGonagall and Snape were breaking up what could have soon turned into Hogwarts’ first full-blown riot in years. All of the participants had house points deducted, though some noted Gryffindor seemed to have come out of it worse off than Slytherin.

 

\-----------------------------

 

One thing could be said for the bigoted and hateful majority within Slytherin, they were certainly interesting to talk to. Whether they were discussing politics or how they planned to beat up dirty-blooded underclassmen, they were engaging from beginning to the end. The moderates, those that didn’t share these same ideals or the same pure blood, were definitely not up to Draco’s standards in social interactions, for the most part. Sure, one could count Theodore Nott as a moderate of sorts, seeing as he held everyone in equal contempt, and thus was not opposed to, when unobserved, conversing with Slytherin’s second biggest pariah of recent months about how detestable certain people were and how incompetents should be flayed alive, but those moments were rare as even Nott wasn’t willing to earn the same status by associating with a potential blood traitor, and none of the other interesting people would even talk to him. So, Draco had to talk to people like Tracey Davis and Roy Norbel, and when he was in the mood to converse about Quidditch he could seek out Bletchley; but he was still discontent.

 

However, as Tracey told him about her muggle mother’s cooking, he found himself wondering why he’d once thought muggle borns and half-bloods should be purged from Wizarding society. Now, Draco still wasn’t one-hundred percent sold on muggle-borns being taught in the same schools as full-blooded witches and wizards who had been inducted into the world of magic since their births, but he was a long way away from his old views. Draco would have liked to have had a mother who liked to cook for him, but he knew his own mother would never do house-elf work.

 

And now that his mind had drifted onto his mother, the ever-present problem of the pile of assuredly angry letters he’d received also jumped to his mind, haveing received another in the morning post. He needed to open them, and then it struck him, how he could lessen the blow. He would prank Gaara for revenge, thus equalising the status quo between them and allowing them to be friends again, before reading them. Good news before the bad.

 

“Hey, Draco, what’s Gaara actually like?” Roy said out of the blue, “I mean, no one actually knows anything about him and since you two are, like, you know, friends, I figured you could tell us some stuff about him. Maybe if people knew who he was, they wouldn’t be so afraid of him.”

 

Draco doubted it, but who knew. Plus he didn’t know anything either, not really, so there was no real danger of disclosing any of Gaara’s well-kept secrets. “Gaara can’t talk and he’s inept at magic. He’s strong, in a muggle way, and he likes to read.”

 

There was a collective pause as his small group of listeners were either letting that titbit sink-in or were waiting for Draco to continue with something juicier that wasn’t already public knowledge. When it became apparent that the moderately prejudiced aristocrat was finished sharing, a collective sense of disappointment washed over them and Davies was first to air hers, “Um, Malfoy, isn’t there anything else you could tell us? We just... want to get to know him better.”

 

“Well, he’s very quiet, you know; there’s really not much to tell. Gaara can be dense from time to time, and accidentally hurts people sometimes. I mean, he almost cooked me alive the other day, but-”

 

“Wait, what!?”

 

“Oh, no, it _was_ an accident. I still haven’t talked to him, though that selfish prick hasn’t even apologised.” And now he was forced to socialise with these dreadfully boring individuals over breakfast; though, that didn’t mean he wouldn’t be polite and tactful about it.

 

“Really? He sounds even scarier in person.”

 

“Yeah, is it true he-” Norbel’s surprisingly keen eyes had apparently spotted the Devil of which they had been speaking appearing at the entrance to the Great Hall. Roy’s stare was followed swiftly by everybody else at the table, minus Draco; all of whom not-so-subtly gawked at the boy they’d just been gossiping about. Draco steadfastly ignored his soon-to-be-friend-again-pending-childish-revenge while the others tried to tone down their gazes to acceptably inconspicuous levels.

 

A clearly uncomfortable Ichibi Jinchūriki sat down on his own, away from the indiscreet gapers and Draco, and began to eat heartily, having stayed out all night again and not having slept a wink. Gaara had spent the cold dark hours in the school’s library continuing his research and rereading ‘Speechless Spellcasting and You: A Beginner’s Theoretical Guide’ in preparation for his fast approaching supplementary lesson.

 

Munching on dry toast, Gaara noticed that Draco, while still avoiding and flashing him venomous glares from time to time, also occasionally let slip a terrifyingly familiar gleam of mischief that he’d long since learned to avoid whenever he was within a hundred miles of Konoha for fear of orange hair dye or buckets of glue and feathers. It wasn’t just his dignity Gaara wished to protect, as important as it was, but also the well-intentioned prankster’s health, Gaara having concussed the ‘Number One Hyperactive, Knucklehead Ninja’ on more than one occasion in evading one of his ill-conceived practical jokes. That this ~~humorous~~ _monstrous_ evil had followed him to an entirely new world and a new blond was testament to Gaara’s justifiably paranoid behaviour. Whatever Draco was planning, the probable target would be keeping his pitch-rimmed eyes firmly open.

 

Meanwhile, the assuredly insidious plot was already beginning to take form in Draco’s vindictively focussed mind, and, if all went according to plan, it would be the most poetic of justices. But first the heir to the noble Malfoy family needed to contact his exotic Wizard’s-furniture dealer.

 

Later that day, an uneventful dinner, following a largely uneventful school day, finished with Gaara in a serious rush to increase the distance between himself and Draco and his rapidly expanding malicious aura. Once or twice the mute had actually caught his roommate chuckling quietly to himself as he glanced over to the presumed target.

 

He had another hour or two before Lupin finished his work for the night and could move onto teaching Gaara, so the **second** smallest Jinchūriki (‘Kami bless Yagura’) decided to do some light dementor hunting in the woods as his after-dinner exercise. He’d gotten nothing but grief from the visiting prison guards and they were a liability, not only to their target, his good friend who was now hiding perilously close, but also to all of the relatively innocent children in the school. Plus he _really_ wanted to kill something, anything, after another full day of sitting down, being told absurd facts about a world he wouldn’t be staying in and being treated like an academy student.

 

As the red-head tore yet another of the cloaked monstrosities apart, he pondered not just on whether if he would run out of dementors at some point but also about if he should be dedicating more of his time to researching his way home or on researching his raccoon-dogthropy. He had considered going back to the library instead of killing wraiths but after weeks of sitting, learning and reading, even the admitted bookworm needed a break. And he certainly wasn’t going near Slytherin after what he saw that lunchtime, when he had gone down to find Draco attaching a mysterious letter to an owl’s leg; and a cursory glance at Draco’s desk had shown he’d not touched his parent’s letters. Who did Draco have to send a letter to?

 

Suppressing a deep shiver from the damning possibilities or the declining temperature, the sand enthusiastic finished his eleventh dementor of the evening and headed back to the castle. He was probably about on time. He would usually examine the setting sun’s position to gauge the time but with the thick cloud layer here he would be hard pressed to distinguish between night and day. But then, at least it wasn’t raining... He hated the weather in this ‘England’ place with a passion, and apparently this was the popular consensus among the population. The people in Suna, for their many faults, had come to terms with their climate and some, namely Sabaku no Gaara, had thrived in it.

 

The DADA classroom was totally empty and that irked Gaara somewhat. He was sure he was at least close to on time, and by any standard it was at least polite for one to wait a while, especially since this late appointment was currently holding his sickly teacher’s wand and trying to work out if a wizard’s twig could be replaced easily or if it would be crippling to snap Remus’. Before his hardened fingers could flex the wand into kindling, Lupin appeared through the back door with his customary tired smile and polite greeting.

 

“I’m afraid,” he began from atop the stairs at the back of the room, “I won’t be able to help you _practically_ tonight. You see, I’ve had a little trouble finding my wand the last few days and I haven’t had a chance to got to Diagon Alley to get a replacement, so I’ll have to stick to the theory for now. I shan’t try using your wand. Certainly not. The wand that chose you almost killed me the other day, I’d hate to think, the damage it could do in anyone else’s hands.” Lupin stopped as he heard a wooden creaking coming from somewhere close by, as he neared the small third-year carrying the massive gourd. “But don’t worry, soon enough you’ll be the one giving tips to your classmates, I’m sure. I’ll do everything I can to help you.”

 

With a mildly baffled face, not all that used to such open-faced kindness, especially from adults, a pensive Gaara reached into his pocket and pulled out Lupin’s wand and held it out to him. The questioning look instantly disappeared from Moony’s features as he recognised the ornate carvings of his very own lost wand.

 

“Lily! You found it! Oh, you brilliant boy! Wherever did you find it?”

 

Gaara had considered coming clean, answering ‘In your pocket’ somewhat snidely, but being called by some woman’s name really pissed him off so he just shirked off his book bag and took out his own stick, ready to begin.

 

“Oh, yes, let’s get started.” The excitement of his returned wand bled into Remus’ voice despite the probability of impending pain he was about to experience in the line of his duty as a friend and a teacher.

 

And thus began Gaara and Lupin’s first extra spell-working lesson. Lupin began by explaining some of the basic theory behind wordless casting as well as a few tricks he’d picked up over the years to make it a little easier, and then, once that pool of knowledge had gone dry, he swiftly moved onto a few practice duels that caused more than scratches and dents to the stone-walled room. By the time the undercover werewolf called it quits for the night both teacher and pupil were winded by their practices. And, to both males’ surprise, Remus hadn’t been terribly injured, as he’d feared he might, but it did highlight to the war veteran just how powerful Gaara’s mysterious control over the sand was, that all but his strongest spells and curses had simply bounced off of the protective shield. Towards the end, Lupin had tried asking, again, about the boy’s sand, about his home, about anything, but as always he was ignored. It spoke volumes about Gaara on its own, that he was able to make being mute work so tirelessly for him and his secrets.

 

“Well, it’s going to take a while, but soon I’m sure, you’ll have caught up and you’ll stop blowing things up,” Remus said, handing Gaara’s bag back to him, “I mean, last week your Stunning spells were almost as powerful as the Killing Curse and now you can cast them safely. A small but great step.” The proud smile on Lupin’s face was a little strange for Gaara and so he bowed his thanks for the help and made to depart. “Good night Gaara and well done, really well done. We’ll do this again in three days, okay?” Gaara nodded back to his caring teacher as he walked out of the door.

 

Gaara had had a fun time, honestly. Other than the obvious betterment that was always on his agenda, it had been sort of nice to be in the company of Remus, who was the first person to actually _talk_ to him in a quite some time. With how Draco had been acting lately, Gaara had been on his own, and he had figured the (more) normal teen would be making the first move to reconciliation but now Gaara wondered if he should make some kind of concerted effort in the matter. Though, how one went about such an endeavour was totally beyond him. He’d usually rely on Kankuro and Temari for this sort of situational advice. None of it had ever made any sense to him.

 

Gaara, now too wrapped up in his thoughts regarding his failing social relationships and his distant home to sleep in an unused, dusty classroom, wound up wandering the outside of the castle, roaming along the outside of the walls and up the various towers. With the waning moon still illuminating the countryside adequately, along with the myriad of stars that had apparently come out since he’d gone inside that evening, Gaara was able to appreciate both the magnificent night time view atop one of Hogwarts’ highest towers as well as the startling number of dementors that were still swarming around in the distant grounds and forest.

 

What the preoccupied insomniac had failed to consider was that when the unsuspecting students of Ravenclaw House heard a distinct tapping coming from their ceiling, as if something was walking on their roof, and they, a small group of seventh-years who’d been in the top rooms, poked their heads out the windows to investigate, the scare the sight of him walking along their walls, parallel to the ground, was enough to make all of the witnesses to such a vampiric feat faint. And so the second great house of Hogwarts was pranked by the infamous Weasley twins, having apparently slipped some kind of unknown nightmare-inducing potion into the less-than-brave Ravenclaw seventh-years’ dinners the night before. Once again all charges were categorically denied and the suspects tried to work out who could be out to frame or, worse, outdo them. Even they had to admit that using the scary, Slytherin, exchange student for material in a nightmare was genius.

 

\-----------------------------

 

Over the next few weeks in October, Gaara continued his lessons at night with Professor Lupin and no one was any the wiser as to why Gaara hadn’t landed nearly as many people in the Hospital Wing as had previously been typical for the Walking Curse (an epithet he’d been gifted with before). Now, Gaara wasn’t improving at any sort of prodigious rate, which was why most of his teachers still hesitated before allowing him to practice in their classes, but he’d still improved much faster than anyone could have imagined. Though, those imaginations would have based their pessimistic projections on the fact that the exchange student wasn’t getting regular after hours tuition from Hogwarts’ first capable Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher in a decade, but the fact remained that he barely wrecked one classroom since the beginning of the month.

 

It was truly the highlight of Lupin’s entire week when he had been on his way to submit his student progress reports to McGonagall after she’d made a big to-do about comparing subjects, and he’d (coincidentally) walked past Filius Flitwick’s Charms classroom and had seen Gaara performing a spell – perfectly. Gaara had conjured the Bluebell Flames, a simple but precise fire spell, without destroying surrounding furniture, without causing a violent explosion, without causing any injury to surrounding parties whatsoever; it had been a perfectly normal charm. And then Flitwick, already a courageous man for allowing Gaara to try fire magic in his class, praised the ever-stoic Gaara for his ‘diligent work’ and ‘phenomenal improvement’. It was the first time, that Remus had heard of or could imagine, that Gaara had been praised in Hogwarts. He literally whistled on his way to Minerva’s office, before he was harshly told to cease that incessant noise by the ever-terrifying Professor McGonagall who took the reports and sent him on his way.

 

There were only two in the entire castle, other than the werewolf and were-tanuki directly involved, that knew of Gaara’s secret extra lessons. The first was Mrs. Norris, who’d been idly making her rounds, looking for students for her dear Argus to punish, when the cat had peered into the Defence classroom. That was one of the first animals Gaara had encountered in this world that apparently despised him. It was a strange feeling, to be hated by an animal; he had been feared and, recently, loved by them but never loathed. Lupin told him it was perfectly normal with that particular _cat_. In any case, seeing as a teacher, even a ragged, smelly, dog-breathed teacher, was present to dish out some cruel punishment to the trespassing student (seeing how they were firing spells at one another), the surly feline moved on to the next room.

 

The only other individual that had stumbled onto the private tutorials was Severus Snape. Snape had been roaming the halls, hoping, praying, for an out-of-bed pair of students so that he could work off some of the stress he’d been accumulating lately (funnily, ever since a red-topped punching bag had stopped coming to lessons). He’d recently perfected a potion that could make all the food the victim consumed taste like soap for a month. Albus had always politely requested that he not poison the students or punish them too harshly but what the Supreme Mugwump didn’t see wouldn’t hurt him. The pale man had been stalking along the third floor when he had heard some muffled talking, coming from somewhere near the abhorrent werewolf’s classroom so he approached quietly, wishing to startle the hapless children before lightly poisoning them. And then he’d seen, who else but, the shallow monstrosity of a reminder, Gaara, being told by Remus not to forget about their next lesson as Gaara had walked away. And then it’d all made sense, Gaara’s purported spontaneous improvements in all of his other classes (well, he wasn’t about to let the detestable child back into his class after some minor improvements in his wand waving, not without a fight) and Lupin’s inexplicable recent fatigue long before the next full moon: he’d been tutoring _it_ at night.

 

Snape was aware that Malfoy and the sand monster hadn’t seen eye to eye since sometime near the beginning of the month and that Gaara had been sleeping elsewhere at night, an arrangement he’d been perfectly content with as he was sure Gaara was a bad influence on Draco if the pureblood’s recent secretive dealing with an Asian merchant and his trips out into the grounds were any indication. And then there was the population of Slytherin recently violently shunning Malfoy which he was sure was Gaara’s fault somehow. And if the protection of one of his most promising students wasn’t enough, it was also terribly  satisfying to imagine Gaara lying cold in a ditch while Snape was trying to get to sleep; much better than counting sheep. Now, however, the bat had mixed feelings about his most despised pupil’s latest night-time activity: on one hand he hated Gaara much like he hated Potter and any special treatment in the red-head’s favour was despicable in his opinion, but on the other hand Gaara was an embarrassment to his beloved Slytherin as well as to Wizarding kind and any move towards being able to competently practice the divine art of magic was to the benefit of everyone. Eventually, the large scornful part of Severus that wanted to casually and venomously spread that the muted failure hadn’t improved by his own merit at all but had required regular special attention just to reach the level of subpar and that had considered docking points from Gaara’s House, his House, as well as assigning punishment for breaking curfew (regularly, apparently); this well-fed, resentful part of Snape lost out to the neglected division of his psyche reserved for professionalism and pity along with his preferred pragmatism backing it up. The greasy-haired man gave one last disdainful look to the back of the retreating Gaara’s head before turning the way he came and swiftly walking back down to his laboratory. He had just come up with an idea to make his potion even crueller and he wasn’t about to let such a creative idea go to waste, and there were always more students to punish. Soon they would rue the day they ran into Severus Snape... well, they would certainly rue it a great deal more than they already did.

 

\-----------------------------

 

“Good evening, Headmaster.” Lupin drawled in turn, already instinctively bored by this last-minute meeting called by Albus and led by McGonagall, who was carrying with her a large unidentified stack of papers that reminded him too much of his classes under her tutelage nearly two decades ago when he’d have to watch as Sirius was given his tests back like watching a hippogriff being excecuted. Many of the sounds had been the same as well. Now, however, he looked around the room and saw he wasn’t the only one among the staff who’d been hoping for an early night and had instead been called for a meeting in Dumbledore’s office that promised to be less entertaining than counting the hundreds of cracks in his bedroom ceiling before fitfully falling asleep.

 

“Thank you for coming,” McGonagall, for all of her strict briskness and humourlessness, from the looks of her, could have just as easily been one of the many teachers at the meeting only there under duress, rather than the one who had supposedly called the meeting in the first place. “I will try and keep this brief,” A lie, Lupin could tell. “But as you’re all aware, I have been asking some of you to share academic reports from your classes’ first month of school. Those reports were most illuminating and I have been able to ascertain just how the students have been progressing.” Another lie, Lupin thought, but this one was harder to spot. “Both myself and Albus would like to congratulate you all. You have maintained Hogwarts’ exacting standards even with the situation outside of the school the way it is.”

 

Remus, as disinterested as he’d began, managed to tune out even further during the course of Minerva’s in-depth analysis of the reports she’d been given, to the point that he actually had to be nudged to return to reality later in the meeting, and listen-in as Albus apparently continued to speak.

 

“Yes, the Minister has decided to send the head of his Administrative Inspectors to Hogwarts to observe the school during this latest crisis. It’s nothing to be alarmed about, I assure you, and he shouldn’t cause any disruption to your normal activities. I’m sure you’re all as tired as I am so off to bed with you before Argus catches up with you. Oh, and could Remus and Severus stay for a moment. I’d just like a quick word.”

 

After the room had cleared, Lupin turned to the headmaster, a man who had taken great pains over the years to help him with any of his troubles, and quickly began “I am very sorry, I-”

 

“Not to worry, Remus, I’m sure you were just distracted, in deep contemplation over you sterling achievements in your first month’s teaching.” Dumbledore always found the most convenient times to showcase his innate omniscience. Other than himself, the headmaster and Snape, all that was left in the room were McGonagall and a preening Faux. Both the deputy-headmistress and Potions professor looked suitably peeved that Lupin had effectively been sleeping with his eyes open during a staff meeting but both held their tongues. Albus turned to address all three of the room’s occupants, “I just wanted to have a word with the three of you-”

 

“Spare us, headmaster. Even Lupin here is probably aware, on some _unconscious_ level, that you didn’t really call every member of staff to talk about the students’ academic progress. You called everyone here tonight to warn them about the visit tomorrow, and you’ve asked us in particular to stay to discuss the truth behind it regarding a certain loathsome ‘exchange student’. Am I correct?”

 

“Visit?” Lupin intoned, not understanding the significance.

 

“Well, I can’t understand why Lupin is here is the first place. Surely, the boy’s head of house should be sufficient in dealing with this.” Minerva didn’t look any angrier than usual, with her accusation, but to his surprise it was Snape to the rescue.

 

“I can answer that. Lupin here has been giving some extra lessons to Gaara after school to reduce the risk of serious injury to students and bring his spell casting up to the level of a house-elf. I thought it best to avoid broadcasting it to save any embarrassment.” No one bought that Severus was talking about Gaara’s embarrassment.

 

Minerva, stuck between disapproving of the ex-Marauder for sneaking around behind her back at night and pride for helping a struggling Slytherin student, looked back at the only folder left of the pile on Albus’ gigantic desk, “Well, that would explain the vast improvement over the last few weeks. You should have told either myself or professor Dumbledore about this, but under the circumstances it is understandable that wished to be discreet. I had no idea you had taken any particular interest in one of the students, other than Harry Potter, of course.”

 

“Well, it’s a challenge, but teaching Lily is-”

 

“What?” Severus challenged quickly, turning sharply to Lupin with intent eyes.

 

“Yes, Remus, could you repeat that last part?” Dumbledore said curiously, popping another Sherbet Lemon into his mouth when no one else moved to take one when proffered.

 

“Umm, yes, well... It was a silly nickname that... _I_ thought of and it’s sort of stuck since. You know, because of Gaara’s eyes and the hair.” Remus, while wholeheartedly endorsing the stupid epithet, really wished he could lay the blame for it on the escaped con he was currently aiding and abetting who had first said it. Especially, when he turned to see the silent, smouldering rage on Snape’s face and the resigned disapproving look McGonagall had given him many times during his school days as if to reprimand him alone for associating and collaborating with James and the others. Dumbledore let out a short, bellowing laugh and congratulated him on an excellent nickname.

 

“You know, I’ve had over fifty nicknames in my life, but I’ve never actually been called Nick. Nor have I been called Lily; I’ll have to remember that one. A friendly appellation helps to establish strong bonds of friendship. It is inspiring to see one of our professors bonding with their students so closely. To take a disadvantaged student under one’s guiding wing is truly the summit of teaching.”

 

“Err...thank you, headmaster.” Lupin tried not to look as embarrassed for his slipup as he felt and swiftly tried to move back onto topic, wherever that had been. “Now, you were telling us about the Ministry spy they’re sending.”

 

“Oh, yes,” Albus seemed to have forgotten the grim reality of the impending inspection. “Officially it is a gesture of goodwill, that the Ministry of Magic wants to check on the Black situation and the dementors’ presence here as well as a general status report on the students’ progress. Unofficially I made a grave mistake in openly requesting information about Gaara from the Ministry, believing him to be some sort of run-away, but when they found they had no information on anyone matching his description Minister Fudge became concerned and when I wouldn’t hand Gaara over to the Aurors for interrogation he has since convinced himself that Gaara must at least be in league with Sirius Black, if not with the entire collective of Death Eater dissenters that seek to undermine him. Though why I would such an individual is beyond me.”

 

“Paranoid buffoon wouldn’t know a Death Eater if he employed one...” Snape scoffed and took a chair in the corner. “So what is our plan? We obviously cannot allow...”

 

“Henrick Morbidus.” Dumbledore said the name with the same curt and disapproving tone he had used to name Voldemort countless times in the past.

 

“You don’t mean to say that Cornelius is sending that dreadful man here, do you?” Lupin had no clue as to who this Morbidus was but from the deep concern written all over McGonagall’s face, it was clear as to the type of man he should expect.

 

“In any case, even _if_ Gaara isn’t in league with dark forces, we cannot allow him to come into contact with Mr Morbidus. He might not be breaking the law, as far as I can prove, but there are enough questions surrounding the boy to warrant a full investigation by Morbidus’ department. Wouldn’t surprise me any if Fudge decided to send in a squad of Aurors to spirit Gaara away to a holding cell in the Ministry just on a hunch.”

 

Lupin spoke up, “Now, Severus, you’re exaggerating. There _are_ a few mysteries surrounding Gaara, no one’s denying that, but this Henrick...”

 

“Henrick Morbidus is not only the ‘head of Administrative Inspectors’, he is Fudge’s right-hand man. If there is ever a dirty job that he doesn’t even want Lucius or his cronies in on, he calls Morbidus in to do it. The Department of Administrative Inspectors is a front for the Minister’s intelligence gatherers. How is it that you, who fought in the last Great Wizarding War, do not know this?” Snape, even with his customary glare, looked somewhat haunted by his knowledge on the Inspector.

 

“Calm down, please,” Dumbledore had conjured tea for himself and Minerva, and was sat back at his desk looking to have far more control over the situation than Lupin thought probable, under the circumstances. “Now, as Severus said, we cannot allow Henrick to see Gaara, otherwise it will lead to further unanswerable questions.”

 

“Then we should just send the boy away for a day or two, until this farce of an inspection is over. We could send him to Diagon Alley or maybe the Weasleys might be able to put him up for the night.”

 

“Alas, I wish we could, Minerva. Undoubtedly, by now the Minister or rather the Administrative Inspectors will have put Hogwarts’ floo network under surveillance and posted agents in Hogsmeade for the same purpose to stop us from moving Gaara. I’m afraid we will have to be more creative in our approach. We will simply ensure that wherever Mr Morbidus is on the grounds, Gaara is anywhere but. This is why I asked you here tonight, Remus, I need you to move Gaara secretly while Minerva guides the Inspector. When they move, Minerva will contact you and you will take Gaara somewhere else.”

 

“In that case, couldn’t we simply take Gaara somewhere secret in the school to hide until he leaves? I mean, how is Professor McGonagall supposed to signal us with Morbidus stood next to her?”

 

Dumbledore opened one of his desk drawers and retrieved a strange silver compass and a golden coin the size of a Galleon but without any of the details on it. “I had these made some time ago, perfect for hiding from someone, but I never got the opportunity to use them until now. Minerva will carry the coin and with this compass Lupin will know precisely which direction to travel in order to avoid her. And since Morbidus is coming with the express intention of seeing Gaara, if we are not forthcoming with him, we will need an excuse as to why he is not around, otherwise the Minister will indeed send more agents here to check up on us. So, as Remus and Gaara move through the school, many of the students will see Gaara and so when Morbidus asks, and he will ask, where our new exchange student is, the pupils will be able to point him in every direction he is not.”

 

“It’s convoluted enough to be one your plans, Albus. Are you sure Lupin will be able to follow your directions properly?”

 

“Don’t worry about me Severus; I haven’t lost my way in this school since my first year. However, if you want to give Lily- I mean Gaara his tour around the school, I’m sure I could keep myself busy. Who knows, he might appreciate the chance for a one on one with his head of house.”

 

“Enough!” Honestly, Minerva could swear she was dealing with her second year Transfiguration class with the way they were going on at each other. If her memory served, which it always did, both Severus and Remus _had_ acted like this in their second year Transfiguration classes. She didn’t stand for it then and she wouldn’t stand for it now.

 

“You’re quite right, my apologies, Minerva.” Lupin had no intention of saying sorry to Snape and he was sure it wouldn’t be received kindly in any case. “Headmaster, when is the Inspector coming?”

 

“Really, Remus! Albus told us all that before everyone left.” Minerva often wondered if the rest of Remus’ friends would have retained their childishness into their adult years like he seemed to have, if things hadn’t gone the way they did. “Morbidus is coming in two days time. ‘A last minute inspection’, indeed!”

 

“Okay, I will take Gaara aside after breakfast on Friday and we will keep moving during the day. Is there anything else?”

 

“No, my boy, sorry to have kept you so long but I’m sure you see how vital this task is for both us and Gaara. Good night Remus, and good night Minerva.” As everyone stood to leave, Dumbledore called out, “Severus, if I might speak to you alone for a moment.”

 

\-----------------------------

 

The castle’s paintings were rather upset when their sleep was disturbed by the incessant and repetitive sneezing of a strange giant-gourd-carrying student who was stalking the halls at this ungodly hour. The red-head himself was quite perplexed as he’d never gotten a cold before and he had also never been the subject of another’s conversation so often that his continuous sneezes had led him out of the library for fear of splattering the precious books with mucus. It was disgusting and inconvenient. Also, his recent sense of foreboding, that he’d solely attributed to Draco’s plotting, had doubled since his sneezing began.

 

This, the coming last week of what had been a remarkably peaceful month of October, in which he’d transformed into a tanuki-human hybrid, befriended a giant three-headed dog, taken up magic lessons with a man calling him ‘Lily’ and wronged his friend and was now awaiting what was sure to be a terrible retribution, was sure to cause him all sorts of trouble, even by his warped standards. He just knew it. And then there was the waxing of the moon that was leading to his next transformation in about a week’s time. Even the pessimist in Gaara couldn’t envision the full moon’s effects getting any worse.

 

But still, what did he ever do to deserve... oh, right, the indiscriminate murders...

 

 

 

Omake:

 

A few months ago, long before the utter craziness of England and the Wizarding World, it had been three months since the failed Suna-Konoha War and the Chunin Exams and Temari and Kankuro had set up a small party. It had been two who months since their Gaara had killed an innocent person and they thought it was worth celebrating this milestone with a party, only inviting the relevant people, which was pretty limited seeing as most of the village still saw him as a monster. When Baki arrived at the Sand Siblings flat, he brought a little alcohol with him and after that the small gathering really started to party.

 

It was only an hour after the party had actually began that Gaara returned home from his wandering musings on his pivotal battle; whereupon he found many more people than had been invited all dancing and drinking in his family’s shared apartment. Among the revellers were Baki, singing something incomprehensible, Temari chatting up some uncomfortable looking guy, and Kankuro half-naked on top of the coffee table.

 

“I’ll kill anyone who doesn’t leave.” The quiet words from the quiet boy seemed pierce right through the crowd despite the loud music and happy atmosphere and immediately everyone exited the apartment, minus the two inebriated sand siblings who quickly tried to calm the baby brother down before he went out and indulged in his old hobby.

 

The road to recovery is a long and slow one, especially for Gaara.

 

“I told you we should have invited him.”

 

“Shut up, Kankuro!”


	6. A New Conflict

 

A sense of looming dread hung over Gaara all that Friday morning, since the sun had presumably risen behind the thick cloud layer. He was sat eating his breakfast sedately, watching disinterestedly as the inhabitants of Hogwarts who actually slept at night roused and stumbled into the Great Hall, for almost two hours before he was actually acknowledged and approached. Thankfully, this time it wasn’t a first-year on a dare to walk up to him; a game that had become increasingly popular over the last few days, and a game which he couldn’t decide whether he should ignore or discourage, seeing as it probably wouldn’t do any harm to let some of the residents of the castle see that he didn’t actually eat ‘firsties’ for breakfast.

 

No, the man who approached Gaara was certainly older than, and definitely not as spry as, a first-year. Lupin wasn’t an early bird, despite his studious nature, which was probably one of the reasons he was able to bond so well with the otherwise drastically different and less academically enthused Sirius and James; but nonetheless he had gotten up earlier than he usually would have liked in order to catch Gaara at breakfast, as the red-headed insomniac was always the first person there in the mornings.

 

“Good morning...Gaara,” By this point, Gaara was already suspicious. The prideful Jinchūriki had been prepared to launch a jet of sand at the sickly professor the moment he was called by that dreadful, humiliating name again, so when he was actually called by his real name, he tried to work out if he could escape through the Great Hall’s see-through roof. He stood, wanting to try it, to escape whatever the man had planned for him. He may have been taking lessons off of Lupin, and shared several (though, by no means all) highly incriminating secrets with the man, considered him to be somewhere between a respected teacher and a friend, but when Remus Lupin called him ‘Gaara’ right off the bat without any glaring dissuasion, he knew the adult wanted something. However, before the red-head could leap away, Lupin’s hand gripped Gaara’s shoulder in what should have been a warm gesture, and would have appeared to have been just that from afar, but was in fact a precaution by the experienced man to stop Gaara from dashing, teleporting or floating away.

 

“How are you this morning? Did you... sleep... at all? If you have trouble falling asleep, Madame Pomfrey would only be too glad to help...” Gaara, like many other Slytherins, hated inane small talk, however Gaara lacked the requisite tact and patience to conceal it as well as seasoned veterans of mindless chattering like Draco, who one could talk to for an hour without realising he was completely disengaged. Due to the scornful looks and frown, Lupin decided to cut to the chase.

 

“The Headmaster knows about our extra-curricular lessons and he’s asked me to spend the day with you, revising all of the material we’ve covered so far in the tutorials; the theory, anyway. We’ll be moving around the castle a little bit as I’m having to work without a classroom for the day. I also have to drop in on a few of the other professors, as well, so it’s the perfect opportunity to get some fresh air in our lungs. _Try_ to think of it as a unique chance to really get to grips with some of this magical theory you’ve had to catch up on, with your very own devoted, one-on-one tutor.”

 

Remus didn’t expect Gaara to believe that spiel, which was fortunate as Gaara’s curiously-invisible eyebrow was already inching upwards in question. This was the story concocted by Dumbledore that was to be their cover and alibi. He was declaring it here, in front of all of the psychopathic transfer student’s (unnecessarily far away) Slytherin peers, so that they could then pass on the word that Gaara had been spirited away by the DADA teacher for extra tuition.

 

Already whispers were beginning to spread as he gently guided the obstinate Gaara away from his cold, played-with breakfast and towards the exit. Remus had no intention of telling Gaara what was really happening that day until it was all over and maybe, if he could help it, not even then. The mysterious mute boy, who had fallen out of the sky only a few months ago, may have appeared and tried to act like an adult, and in many respects he probably was beyond his years, but Lupin couldn’t bring himself to add to his young friend’s already heavy burdens with these new problems. Worrying about the future was the adults’ responsibility; children should only worry about the present, especially when they’ve already suffered through such obviously difficult times.

 

Gaara seemed to have taken his near-death experience in the summer in his stride, but the state Sirius had apparently found him in, and the scars that still remained, still left Remus with more than one sleepless night in recent memory and he knew Sirius had been the same.

 

“We’re going to be stopping off at Professor Hagrid’s home first, for a cup of tea and to pick up a letter he said he needed delivering to Professor Flitwick. I’m sure Hagrid will have some freshly baked cakes he’d be willing to share, as well.” Trying to instil enthusiasm about Hagrid’s infamous cakes to the already unimpressed and sour teenager next to him was difficult, but he tried with renewed vigour as he began to quiz Gaara on Redcaps and the spells to vanquish them.

 

It was testament to Gaara’s diligence that, despite his lack in casting ability (or restraint), his test scores and theoretical proficiency was almost at the average level, which, considering he’d never even heard of wizardry as Lupin’s culture knew it until August, was prodigious. Remus, McGonagall and Flitwick estimated that Gaara could well be near the intellectual level of Hermione Granger and the Ravenclaws, he just didn’t have the experience or the two previous years of knowledge to work from.

 

Gaara just enjoyed reading, a sad rarity outside of Ravenclaw, it seemed.

 

Gaara had his sand form the answers to the easy questions absentmindedly as he walked out into the cold winter wind (he didn’t believe that England had such a thing as summer or fall). He trusted Lupin enormously, even if he did want to escape any troublesome tasks or conversations that might be required by their interactions. He trusted the man enough to follow him around for the rest of the day when he wasn’t even being told the real reason beyond the cover story that had been announced to the listeners around him in the Great Hall. It was a smart move and Lupin would have made a good shinobi. Kami knew they’d made sicklier men into warriors in his world, even if his own sensei had killed the best example of such men that came to mind, in Konoha.

 

Gaara had never been to Hagrid’s ‘house’ before, he’d never had any reason to, and now he was there he had to question their use of the word ‘house’. He looked at the shed at the bottom of the hill with the big, old black dog laid out, chained by the door to the hut, looking to the world no different than a dead hound Hagrid had collected to feed to one of his more intimidating pets.

 

The oversized boarhound’s head shot up, the flappy skin following swiftly after, as Lupin and Gaara came within smelling distance. Immediately, it barked loudly and achingly rose to its feet before falling back down into sitting position, watching as the two visitors came within petting distance. Remus, of course, heartily ruffled the dog’s head and had his hand covered in saliva for his troubles. When Gaara was to pass by to get to the big wooden door, he saw the dog move its head towards his hand. He really didn’t want to touch the smelly dog, not least because he’d been covered in more than a lifetime’s worth of dog saliva only a few weeks before. His _sand armour_ just wasn’t thick enough to suffer that disgusting feeling again. The dog’s head-butting became more insistent but before he was forced to play with another annoying dog, the door to the hut slammed open and the entire archway was filled side-to-side with Rubeus Hagrid’s smiling form as he beckoned both teacher and pupil inside, out of the cold.

 

“Morning! It’s nice to be seeing you again, Gaara, and you too Remus. Don’t mind old Fang there, he’s as harmless as they come. Right old bag of mush, he is. Not like my Fluffy. He makes Fang look like a puppy, though poor-old Fluffy really is only a puppy.”

 

“I didn’t know you had another dog,” Lupin asked, intrigued, as he sat down at the table next to Gaara who seemed to be trying his hardest to touch as little of the ‘natural’ smelling abode as he could.

 

“Yeah, I got Fluffy a couple of years ago off a nice Greek bloke at the pub.” He reminisced happily, putting a pot over the fire to boil, “Professor Dumbledore had him working up in the castle couple of years ago, he did. Perfect little guard dog, Fluffy was. But then they didn’t need him no more so they sent him outside again. He’s such a cute puppy, domesticated and as harmless as Fang if he knows you, and loves his music.” Gaara was trying to remember where he had heard the name Fluffy before. It wasn’t exactly a regular name, but then none of the names in this world seemed to be normal to him and since he’d lost the ability and requirement to say names at all, he’d become a little relaxed with remembering people’s appellations. Still, he could have sworn he’d seen the name somewhere, and he didn’t exactly hang around a lot of animals, just Hagrid’s menagerie and... the gigantic three-headed hellhound that wagged its tail as soon as it smelled him coming from a mile. He’d seen Fluffy’s name on its food bowl.

 

“Of course, I understand it would have been a bit difficult to keep him in the castle, with him being as big as he is, but he really wasn’t as bad as all that. I told him to keep everyone away from the hatch in his room and he did, just like he was told, like a good boy, you know, until Quirrel and Harry and his friends snuck past. He wouldn’t hurt no one, normally. I get so worried with him out there, all on his own. I visit him as often as I can, bring him his dinner and everything, but recently he’s not been listening to me and he’s not been eating his supper.” Ah, so Gaara had been retraining and spoiling the meals of the groundskeeper’s beloved three-headed dog. Somehow the beast’s ownership didn’t make it seem any more surreal to him than it already was.

 

“Well, I’m sure... _Fluffy_ is enjoying the freedom. He’s not had any trouble from that nest of acromantulas, has he?” Lupin asked, sipping on his tea, well used to discussing Hagrid’s unique brand of animal-care.

 

“No, I tell Aragog to keep his kids away from Fluffy and any of my animals. He knows better than to cause trouble. Besides, with Fluffy being that big, even Aragog or Mosag would probably have trouble taking him down.”

 

“Mosag?”

 

“Oh, yeah, that’s Aragog’s wife. Lovely spider, she is. Even-tempered. Never once tried to eat me.” Gaara supposed that was one of the highest compliments that Hagrid could bestow upon any of his animals.

 

“I heard about the original acromantula male in the Dark Forest, before I came here, one of the biggest in the world according to the Monster Book of Monsters. But I didn’t know about the female. Where did she come from?”

 

Hagrid began to look distinctly nervous, suspiciously so, “Well, Aragog was beginning to get real restless and lonely out there on his own, going through his teenage years, I suppose, so I, well, I did something I’m not strictly supposed to. Don’t go telling Professor Dumbledore. I don’t reckon he’d be too pleased, but I had her sent over from Argentina, just to keep Aragog company, but then came the kids. They’re not badly behaved, ask anyone, except Ron Weasley and Harry, but they do get up to a little mischief every now and then.”

 

“Your secret’s safe with me.”

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Albus Dumbledore, aged somewhere in the triple digits, had seen all sorts of people over the years and had become a particularly good judge of character, after a fair few mistakes in his earlier life; but never before had he seen a man that could be summed up with a single characteristic in all of his life: gaunt.

 

Henrick Morbidus was an unforgiving individual, taller than Albus by a head, if not more, and was as insubstantial as a broom. His thin glasses sat on his bony nose as he looked directly down it at one of the greatest wizards of the century. Albus couldn’t remember ever having met Mr Morbidus before, certainly not from Morbidus’ school days, presumably having been schooled sometime during Albus’ first years as Headmaster, when he was still trying to work through the paperwork Headmaster Dippet had left him. But Dumbeldore, as he looked up at the impeccably dressed government official, had known as soon as the Inspector had flooed into his office just how little the wan bureaucrat thought of ‘civillians’.

 

“Good morning, mister Morbidus. Please have a seat. You’re a little earlier than expected, I’m afraid I haven’t made any tea yet.” Of course, Albus had known the man would come earlier than scheduled, he’d been sat in his office since five that morning, waiting. It was the oldest trick in the politicians handbook.

 

“Not to worry, headmaster, this shan’t be a social visit. I’m only here to look around and see if things are running smoothly.” The tension in the man’s low, gravelly voice made the measured pace in his well-mannered speech sound so calculating that it left Albus a little envious. “You needn’t worry about my presence here today, I simply need to ascertain that the welfare of the students hasn’t been adversely affected by the dementors stationed at Hogwarts and that everything elsewhere is operating as it should, under the circumstances.”

 

“I’m always glad to hear that our Ministry has the children’s best interests at heart.” Dumbldore’s smile was his shield against the obvious yet still veiled reference to Gaara. So, they didn’t want to admit to their veritable witch-hunt just yet. Two could play at this game, and he had the greatest school of wizardry in the world on his side. “I’m afraid, with my day-to-day duties in running the school, I won’t have time to show you around.” He knew he was being quite rude in dismissing the powerful Henrick Morbidus, but he really did have a lot of work to do and he knew that any direct involvement he had in that day’s plan would lead the increasingly paranoid Minister for Magic to suspect some sort of Hogwarts-based conspiracy or plot.

 

“That’s quite alright, Headmaster, I still remember my way around from my school days, I should be able to escort myself where I need to go.” It was painfully obvious to Albus that this was a trap, and that if he gave Henrick free reign then not only would the existing plan regarding Gaara fail but so would any chance of keeping the Ministry out of Hogwarts. A lot more went on in this school than the Ministry of Magic needed to know; mysterious transfers, possessed teachers, werewolves and Hagrid’s pets, to name but a few.

 

“Worry not, I’ve asked our deputy headmistress to show you around. Professor McGonagall knows perhaps as much about this castle’s running as I do, she should be able to answer all of your questions. Hmm, she should be here any minute; we weren’t expecting you until later so she’ll just be finishing her breakfast.” In fact, Minerva had been stood at the bottom of the spiral staircase, waiting for his signal, for the last half hour. Upon the signal, the staircase ascending up to the headmaster’s office, Minerva walked up the stairs and wished she had had a chance to actually get some breakfast, if only to settle her stomach, but she couldn’t be seen in the same room as Gaara at all today, and Albus’ thrice-damned theatrics might suffer if she hadn’t been waiting for the inspector’s arrival to make her own timely and dramatic entrance.

 

“Ah, here she is now.”

 

“This really isn’t necessary, headmaster. I would hate to trouble such a key member of your staff.” The cadaverous official was watching the door, listening to the grinding of the staircase that he remembered from when he was a boy, while peering out of the side of his glasses at the suspicious old man the Minister no longer trusted.

 

“That’s quite alright. As you said, it’s not a social visit so we will do whatever we can to accommodate the Ministry’s requests. Besides, Minerva is perfectly capable of managing all of her duties, isn’t that right, Professor McGonagall?”

 

“Quite, Albus. It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Mr Morbidus.” She lightly shook the man’s bony hand as his dark eyes gazed directly at her. “Now, as you are a somewhat early, we’ll make a start with the inspection. I imagine you’ll be wanting to inspect the grounds around the outside of the castle, as well?”

 

“Among other areas. The Minister for Magic wanted a very thorough inspection due to the serious matters surrounding the school as of late.”

 

“I hope you’ll give Cornelius my best wishes upon your return, and I ask only that you not disrupt the students’ learning during the course of your inspection.” Blue eyes over half-moon spectacles perched on the end of a crooked nose stared directly into the dark, fastidious holes scrutinising everyone around them.

 

“But of course, headmaster. After you, _Professor_ McGonagall.” The owner of those dark eyes swiftly turned to the door and waved the unnerved Transfiguration mistress through first.

 

Albus was having serious doubts, now that he’d met the inspector. The resemblance to Morbidus’ cousin, Pius Thicknesse, was uncanny and unsettling. What was worse was that the Headmaster knew that Morbidus was aware that they were scheming and would do everything within his considerable capabilities to uncover it. But Albus’ role in this game was finished for the moment; he had to leave it up to Minerva and Remus now.

 

If someone had mentioned, twenty years ago, that he would be entrusting such an important task to one of James Potter’s insidious Marauders, he would have laughed, and believed it wholeheartedly. His faith in the insurmountable Gryffindor spirit aside, Remus had always been such a reliable boy, twenty nine days out of the month.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Meanwhile, Gaara and Remus had just delivered the letter - which Gaara suspected to be empty - to Professor Flitwick, who had taken the opportunity to praise the irked demon-host on his success lately, again. Once more, the wandering teacher and pupil had been invited in for refreshments and conversation by their appointment. The shinobi was further put-out when he was handed a fresh glass of milk while Lupin was given tea. It seemed that precious few in this world understood that a younger person was capable of maturity. Gaara wasn’t exactly consoled that the miniature Charms professor had also opted to partake of cold milk. Gaara wasn’t even that short! Still, outrage aside, he didn’t turn the drink down. Cold milk on a hot day was a delicacy in Sunagakure, and even if it was freezing cold outside, he didn’t want to be rude. 

 

After finishing their conversation, Flitwick taking one last chance to praise Gaara’s hard work and improvement, Lupin and the completely un-bashful transfer student left. As the pair were walking, seemingly aimlessly, through the school, every once in a while Lupin would look at his strange new silver watch and then take them off in another direction, more often than not back the way they had just come. All the while, the devoted teacher continued to talk about material old and new, including some minor wizarding cultural trivia. None of which particularly interested Gaara, but he tried to remember the useless knowledge, sure in the belief that if he failed to learn it, he would eventually be asked about it all.

 

Truth be told, Gaara had never been to a school of any kind before Hogwarts, his monstrousness, attemped assassinations and Suna’s hands-on approach to training meant that he’d never been inside of a classroom. Tests had been given by Yashamaru, but were usually to do with how he’d liked a book or how he felt. Baki had once tried a test, more physical than mental, when they’d first been put onto his team. It hadn’t ended well. Now that his life, or at least a large part of it for the time being, was devoted to academia, he became aware of just how hard the civilian students had it, learning so much nonsense.

 

Several students stopped to stare as Gaara walked by, the ‘ _transfer student’s_ ’ legend having spread before most even saw him and his strangeness. So, now, when he walked the halls being tutored by the Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher and wandlessly controlling sand to form answers he couldn’t speak, he gained attention.

 

At that point, Gaara thought that he’d more-or-less figured out what this _secret plan_ was. Well, he knew that he had been taken out of his regular classes, and then spirited around the school in the full gaze of the student body and teachers, and was being kept in the dark. It was most likely that someone was looking for him, someone that meant to do him harm and not anyone else, and that they had to pretend to be doing nothing out of the ordinary whilst hiding. Even his father could have come up with a better, or at least more secretive plan, than this one. Though that plan most likely would have led to another war, but, then, Gaara _was_ a war machine. These wizards and their underestimating him tested his patience more than people in spandex using their holiday time to run to his village and challenge him to fights.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

After a fake prophecy that assured him that everything would definitely be ‘fine’ for the foreseeable future from the ill-reputed Divinations professor, Sybill Trelawney, Morbidus was about ready to give up on his mission to locate and investigate the mystery that had been admitted to the greatest wizarding school in Europe. He was a professional, but the frustration of dealing with children who all pointed him in different directions when directly asked about this Gaara child, and the teachers who outright lied to him when he asked if anything strange had happened or appeared in the school recently, was trying his patience. The students would tell fanciful tales of a red-headed boy who could make objects move with his mind and killed first years at night. The only ‘facts’, or definitive consensus, that he could discern were that the boy was mute, had a distinctive physical appearance, carried a large bag of some kind on his back, and had ‘scary eyes’. It was a start but it wasn’t the most promising one. Apparently the boy had become a pariah since arriving in the school so most of the tales he heard he chalked up to being nothing more than hearsay.

 

“Excuse me,” The imposing man cornered a short blond-haired boy who had been leaving his class with a group of friends before McGonagall could stop him. “Would you happen to know the third-year Slytherin Gaara, by any chance?” The boy’s strong resemblance to Lucius Malfoy was a dead-giveaway, so Morbidus believed himself to have gotten lucky when he saw the young Malfoy heir that would be the same age and House as his target. Surely this would lead to some promising information.

 

“Yes, he’s my roommate. My name is Draco Malfoy, and who might you be?” Proper decorum and hostility befitting a Malfoy; the man could see the boy one day becoming a formidable political figure like his father, and that could only aid him here and now, seeing as the boy had such unrestricted access to his target and was at least loyal to his father, who was playing the part of allegiance to the Ministry, at the moment.

 

“Good morning, my name is Henrick Morbidus, head of the Ministry of Magic’s Department of Administrative Inspectors.  Would you mind terribly if I asked you a few questions about your current schooling experience during these... troubled times, and about your roommate, as we don’t seem to have his records and such a gap in the Ministry’s files is a troubling lapse, I’m sure you agree.” While he knew it was rude to play games with Lucius Malfoy’s son, he couldn’t afford to be as open as he’d like in front of Dumbledore’s right-hand witch.

 

Draco looked up at the man his father had once complained about as being ‘a man with more dirty secrets than the Dark Lord’ and felt a cold quiver drip down his spine. This man worked alongside his father, a temporary loyalty he had understood for a couple of years now, and he knew he was expected to be up front about all of the peculiarities surrounding Gaara, as if his father himself had asked.

 

_Instead_ , Draco answered: “I’m afraid there isn’t much I can tell you, he’s very closed-off and, you understand, he can’t speak at all. Though, he doesn’t sleep much, sir.” He hoped this would appear to be just ignorant and not quite as treasonous as it felt. From the look in the inspector’s eyes and tight jaw, apparently his ruse hadn’t gone unnoticed.

 

Actually, it had. The head of the Ministry’s secret little division was angry because of the combined ignorance of all of these school children, even the son of such a well-bred wizarding family, and the conspiring teachers. Despite the probability that the mystery was just that, a mystery to everyone including the students, even the one he was rooming with, he couldn’t risk leaving a well of information untapped so he tried to increase the pressure. After all, throughout this conversation, unlike before, McGonagall hadn’t busily asked him to leave the student alone but had instead stood back, tense and wary. “It pains me to hear that a promising new student hasn’t opened up to anyone here. As his roommate I would have expected someone with such an astute father as your own to have at least made a measure of someone so close to them.” Attack his pride and mention his father in the same sentence, cruel but if the file on the Malfoy family was as accurate as it should be, the son should be afraid of his father and very proud.

 

“As I’m sure you’re learning, Mr Morbidus, sir, Gaara is a bit of an enigma, but you probably haven’t been looking very deeply into something like a new student, after all. A man of your position wouldn’t have trouble finding information like that, now, would he?” Draco could have kicked himself for falling for the jibe and succumbing to his pride again. He’d just pissed off a man his father was wary of. There _was_ a reason he wasn’t in Ravenclaw, and several for why he wasn’t in Hufflepuff, but it was times like these that he wondered why the Sorting Hat hadn’t at least paused to consider putting him in with the easily-roused Gryffindors.

 

“Merely running through the appropriate investigative channels. Proper conduct needs to be followed. Now, run along.” The cold, quiet, shivering rage in the gaunt man’s voice told Draco not to hang around to celebrate his small victory on the terrible man. He quickly scarpered, catching the mix of pride and worry he thought he’d never catch on McGonagall’s face pointed in his direction.

 

“I think it’s about time for the students to go to lunch, we should make our way to the Great Hall, perhaps Gaara will already be there and you can finish your clarification there.” He doubted it, but he followed his guide nonetheless, on the off chance that they were as foolishly confident as the Malfoy child and had decided to parade this ‘Gaara’ in front of him.

 

This was turning out to be a laborious assignment and he wanted something concrete to take back to the Minister, along with his report on the dementors. He still had to follow that up, and would do so soon. He needed to check in the Dark Forest and that forest had been infamously dangerous when he was a child, but now with the dementors it would be perilous even to an adult wizard of his calibre.

 

“Lead the way.”

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

“Hey, have you seen him yet?” Draco asked, looking around to double-check Gaara hadn’t slipped into the hall while his back was turned, again.

 

“No, everyone’s been looking but no one knows where he is. Everyone we ask says he’s somewhere else.” Roy looked worn out, having spent every moment between classes on this favour for Draco. Finding Gaara had been impossible even after he’d enlisted all of his and Draco’s shared friends. Even the teachers hadn’t offered to help their quest to recover the lost student. “Don’t worry, we’ll give Gaara the message eventually.”

 

Draco suspected that Gaara’s disappearance and the performance that morning at breakfast were probably to do with the same creepy inspector also looking for Gaara, and that Gaara’s much needed private magical tutor, Professor Lupin, was probably moving him around. Still, he had set everything up perfectly for that day and for the target to, coincidentally, go into hiding just wasn’t fair.

 

As he made another sweep of the hall, including the ceiling, because with Gaara that was perfectly feasible, he caught sight of Mr Morbidus and Professor McGonagall entering the Great Hall. The platinum blond quickly slipped into a seat and tried not to draw attention to himself. He’d already earned the scary man’s ire and he didn’t need to catch his eye. He was perfectly used to dealing with scary people, his father, Gaara and his head of house to name but three, but Morbidus was different in one key way, unlike the other three, Morbidus clearly would have very few compunctions with having him tortured or killed if he crossed his path in any meaningful way.

 

In retrospect, Draco hoped that the investigation into Gaara wasn’t all that important, otherwise he would certainly be contacting his father soon to beg for protection.

 

And then he looked directly up to the head table and into the watchful eyes of the inspector, without flinching or balking. He should have been cowering, writing letters to his father begging for protection and reassurance, but with that sort of behaviour he wouldn’t have been able to face Gaara. Gaara would glare the terrifying Ministry worker into submission or use his sand to... attack in whatever way Gaara’s sand actually attacked wizards. He wasn’t aiming to be a lion, standing tall and running into all sorts of danger, he’d leave the stupid heroics to the Gryffindors, but he was tired of being nothing more than a snake hiding in the grass. The Dark Lord, a man whose ideals he’d come to doubt but whose abilities and charisma were still admirable in his eyes, would not have shied away from conflicts like a weakling. And while Draco wasn’t about to kill or torture the Ministry lackey, he still wasn’t about to hide in the grass and wait to get stepped on.

 

At the teacher’s table on the other end of the Great Hall, Morbidus had been seated in between McGonagall and Dumbledore, a move he suspected was to separate him from the other staff members who might fare less hardily than the two veterans of political warfare he was stationed between. He didn’t force himself to make small talk and instead spent the mealtime idly sipping the, admittedly sumptuous, soup that had been prepared for him whilst his eyes would dart up and about every few moments to scan the dining hall for anything out of the ordinary. It was over half an hour later that as Morbidus watched and waited for Gaara, a red-headed small boy that would be on his own, he thought he’d gotten lucky, raising an eyebrow in excitement, when he spotted a relatively small ginger boy enter, but was brought down when he recognised Harry Potter at his side and remembered that one of the Weasley boys was a known associate of the Boy Who Lived.

 

‘Time to call it quits on the first line of enquiry.’ Leaning over to McGonagall, Morbidus said, “Would you please escort me to the Dark Forest when you are done here. I have been tasked with investigating a particular matter in regards to the dementors and I require access to them directly. I am fully proficient with the Patronus Charm so there shouldn’t be any issues with the close contact.”

 

McGonagall wasn’t sure which made her more wary, going into the Forbidden Forest filled with dementors among many other nightmarish creatures, of leading the similarly ghoulish entity to investigate the dementors. Quandary though it was, she knew she was more than capable of handling anything in those woods, including the inspector should the need arise. She dabbed her napkin at the corners of her wrinkled mouth and motioned for him to lead the way. She’d lost her appetite anyway.

 

The walk was quiet and the weather was somewhat fair, considering the autumnal turn it had taken lately. When they approached the edge of the forest, Minerva caught sight of Hagrid carrying something assuredly pungent over his shoulders, and being followed by a Hippogriff of all things. She stood still and held out her arm for Morbidus to do the same and stop. By this time, Hagrid and his companion had also stopped, and the groundskeeper watched carefully as the beast he’d been escorting back to its pen spied the others. Minerva bowed slowly and shakily, her old back not giving as easily as a teenagers might, before a silent, straight and composed bow was performed by the visitor. The Hippogriff regarded them, spending more time eyeing Morbidus, before it too lowered its head acquiescing to their approach.

 

“Afternoon, Professor McGonagall. Is this the Inspector we were told about?”

 

“Yes. Mr Morbidus here has asked that he be escorted into the forest to perform a few tests. Would you be so kind as to lead us in?”

 

“Why, of course. No problem. I’ve got a class arriving in a little while, though...”

 

“I’m sure they’ll be fine on their own for a few minutes.”

 

Hagrid cheerfully tried to greet the inspector, going so far as to shake his hand, a gesture which was returned immediately if only to humour the oafish man, but none of Hagrid’s eternal cheer had any visible effect on Morbidus other than for his head to quickly turn to their destination and for him to briskly suggest that they begin if they had other duties to attend to.

 

As they reached the outermost edge of the blanketing line of trees, Hagrid lead his Hippogriff charge off into its corale with the others of its kind and the party continued onwards into the darkness. After only a few minutes of travelling Morbidus reached into his smart suit-robes and brought forth a golden disk that fit comfortably in his long hand, on which a small black smudge stained its surface. As he turned, the smudge seemed to correspond, as it were true north on a compass. They set off with the smudge as their bearing, Morbidus proffering minimal explanation in the way of his reasons for investigating, which were that a few dementors has gone missing since their posting at Hogwarts and he needed to discover whether they had fled or whether they had come to harm, which was a considerable concern as it would mean that someone, possibly their target, had a way of defending himself from the guards.

 

The device lead the trio to a number of dementors over the course of their walk, where McGonagall and Morbidus used the partonus charm to ward them off. Hagrid noted, as he stood behind Minerva trying to find that rogue bar of chocolate he could have sworn he left in his coat last Thursday, that Morbidus’ patronus was underdeveloped considering the man’s supposed ability and influence. It wasn’t even corporeal. But then, Hagrid supposed a man as grim as the inspector might struggle to summon enough happiness to fully manifest one, or maybe the pale man, only a foot shorter than the half-giant, just didn’t see the need to summon a full patronus in the company of only one dementor with another competent witch casting nearby. In any case, Hagrid didn’t speak aloud any of these thoughts, as he sincerely didn’t want to gain any more notice from the inspector than he already had. The Ministry had already taken a lot from him, and last year had shown they wouldn’t hesitate in taking more.

 

After a few more encounters with the dementors still flying around, Morbidus led them to an empty clearing that made the man’s tight lips creak upwards on one side in a queer smirk. Once the grin had subsided, he turned to Professor McGonagall and asked her politely to keep watch whilst he performed his examination, to which the confused witch nodded.

 

Morbidus walked over to the centre of the clearing and stooped low, shifting to one knee, and waved his Ministry gadget over the patch of earth. It beeped and he used the fancy pen he pulled from his pocket to nudge some of the dirt into a small bag before smoothly tucking them both back into his robes and rising.

 

“Thank you for your indulgence. I believe I now have what I came for.” His appreciation was said with a small nod before he turned to Hagrid expectantly.

 

“Hold a minute, Rubeus. Mr Morbidus, what, may I ask, is it that you came out here for?”

 

“I suppose something in the way of an explanation is in order. Our reports indicate that a relatively small number of dementors posted here at Hogwarts have gone missing and I have just ascertained that at least one, possibly more, of the missing dementors was killed.”

 

“Killed? A dementor?” Minerva was shocked, “That’s not an easy task for any witch or wizard, you don’t mean to say that Sirius Black had acquired a wand, do you?”

 

“I don’t mean to imply anything, professor, I am simply here to gather information so that my office, in conjunction with the Ministry, will be able determine after due investigation and consideration the cause behind these disappearances. Before I submit my findings, do you have anything to add, Mr Hagrid? You _are_ the groundskeeper here at Hogwarts, are you not?”

 

“Well, yes, I mean no. I run the grounds and keep the keys, but I ain’t seen nothing that would’ve attack a dementor.”

 

“Are you saying nothing in this forest could kill a dozen dementors over a few weeks?” Henrick was more curious on this point than fulfilling his duty, since all of the known creatures in the Dark Forest surrounding Hogwarts were recorded and well-documented and they would all be researched in the course of the investigation.

 

“I’m sure a lot of things could, but most of the animals is dead afraid of them, so they keep clear.”

 

“So you do not have anything to add to my investigation at all, Mr Hagrid? Something in these woods that you patrol is killing the Ministry’s dementors and you don’t know a single thing. There hasn’t been anything strange or out of the ordinary? Tell me, is there _anything_?” The man’s voice had gotten a little more agitated as he spoke, well below the level one would associate with anger or frustration, but from the even-speaking Morbidus, it was alarming.

 

“I’m sure Hagrid would have told you if he had seen anything.” McGonagall said with finality.

 

“Yes, I imagine you are right, but I have to be thorough.” He swivelled on his heel again, and said to Hagrid, “Now, if you wouldn’t mind, Mr Hagrid. I would like to speak the headmaster again before I depart. I think I have what I need.”

 

As they trudged back to the castle, Hagrid wondered if he should have mentioned that strange little biped he’d seen a few weeks before. Surely it was too small to even reach a dementor, never mind killing one. Maybe it had a parent that was bigger, but then that parent wouldn’t have let it run around on its own when it was so small and defenceless. Though, of course, he couldn’t say for sure without knowing what the thing was. Still, he decided not to mention it in any case because he didn’t want the Ministry sending fifty hunters to smoke it out, along with all of the other things he technically wasn’t supposed to harbour out in the forest.

 

When they exited the canopy of the Dark Forest, Morbidus stopped dead in his tracks without a word and crouched down again. Minerva looked back, worried, before she heard him talking to Hagrid, “Is this a patch of strawberries, by any chance?”

 

“Why, yes. You have a good eye for produce.” Hagrid, for the first time since he’d come into contact with the Ministry official, looked like he had some life in him. Even Morbidus was smiling his grim little smile as he surveyed the vast fields of fruits and vegetables. “I grow most of the fruit and veg for the castle.”

 

“That must be quite the challenge, I don’t suppose those over there- Excuse me, I quite forgot myself. Professor McGonagall, would you mind fetching the headmaster. I’ll say my goodbyes out here. I’ve seen quite enough of Hogwarts for one day. Now, Professor Hagrid, do you happen to grow brussel sprouts, by any chance?”

 

Minerva left quickly, if only to smoulder on her own as she made the long unnecessary trek up to and through the castle so that she could ‘fetch’ the headmaster. She wasn’t a young woman, would it kill people to treat her with a more little respect. She would most definitely be taking a day to herself in the near future. She’d have Severus take over for her. Lupin and her had been spending the entire day playing Albus’ absurd games, and he’d been able to continue as normal. It wouldn’t surprise her any if Remus didn’t get a day or two of his classes covered in the near future as well, which would surely go a long way considering the state he was often left in after a full moon.

 

By the time she was stood in his office, Minerva practically begged Albus to go on without her as she could hardly stand anymore. With a soft smile, Dumbledore thanked her and set off himself, knowing that he owed his old friend a debt of gratitude a simple ‘thank you’ wouldn’t be able to pay.

 

Once the headmaster was gone, Minerva shot Fawkes a dirty look just for being an eternally youthful animal. The thing was preening and pretended not to notice the jealous teacher staring at him.

 

Maybe he’d have to tell her some of the secret passages he used to get about the castle in his frail old age, Dumbledore mused as he walked. He’d wanted to keep those to himself until he retired. They helped maintain the illusion that he was everywhere as well as all knowing. Plus he was able to surprise any slacking students in the corridor. Maybe he should write a few of them down, so that his successor could do the same thing? Hogwarts’ headmasters and headmistresses should always be able to pull one over on the inhabitants of the school.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

As McGonagall had unwittingly stridden into the castle alone, Lupin, having diligently watched his little silver compass, led Gaara back out into the ground surrounding the behemoth of a building. The raggedy professor thought it would be nice to join Hagrid again for a light lunch, under the ‘guise’ of delivering yet another message to the half-giant. Lupin hoped that Gaara was so uninitiated into wizarding culture that he wouldn’t know that there were many simpler ways to pass messages between professors.

 

However, when the pair arrived at the hut for the second time that day, passing the lonely boarhound with the same levels of enthusiasm as before, it was apparent that Hagrid wasn’t home. Remus tried looking through one of the hut’s windows but with them being so clouded and cracked, he couldn’t see any dark looming shapes in the cottage to indicate that Hagrid might be in.

 

More curious still, in the distance, near the edge of the Forbidden Forest, stood (as luck would have it) a third year class of Care of Magical Creatures students, unattended. Apparently their professor hadn’t shown up, if their blatant slacking was any indication. Upon approach, it became abundantly clear that the mixed class of Gryffindors and Slytherins hadn’t seen hide nor hair of their professor since they arrived after lunch. With no other suitable choice, other than leaving a group of fourteen year-olds to their own devices, Lupin decided to take over the class for the time being, until either Hagrid returned or McGonagall and the inspector left the castle again.

 

Whilst Lupin wrangled the surprised class and tried to draw upon the limited knowledge he held regarding magical creatures that weren’t him, Gaara moved over to stand at the back of the class, knowing full well he didn’t need to be taking notes from the overwhelmed Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher.

 

Besides, he’d heard more than enough from the man that day and having had to listen to demonic voices in his head rambling on about murder and carnage for a decade had taught him a few things, including that he had little patience for rambling.

 

That, and he’d learned he wasn’t a cannibal, which had been a great relief to Suna’s citizens and a great disappointment to the monster in his head.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

“Ah, Headmaster. Your Mr Hagrid here was just telling me all about the what’s been happening lately on the school grounds. It’s been fascinating.”

 

“So you’ve seen the nettles over behind the wall? I have to admit, I’ve taken a severe liking to the tea since our Professor Trelawney turned me onto it.” Dumbledore was almost insulted at a ploy as simple as that. He trusted Hagrid as much as he did Severus, maybe even more.

 

“Oh, well, I think I’ll have to see them during my next inspection, whenever that may come. Time is pressing.”

 

“You’re not leaving are you?”

 

“Well, it’s unfortunate but I have other duties to attend to today. Before I go, I feel I should ask, seeing as how I’ve had no luck in the matter, whether you could tell me where that transfer student is. What was his name?”

 

“Gaara?”

 

“Yes. I had only wanted to check in with the boy, make certain he is settling in alright, but he doesn’t seem to be anywhere, or rather he seems to have been everywhere. Is there something I should know, if only to put on record?”

 

“Your dedication to a bright young student is a breath of fresh air, Mr Morbidus. As you can imagine, any student starting late in Hogwarts is bound to struggle to catch up to his peers on his own-” Albus began but was interrupted quite rudely.

 

“Which is precisely why myself and the Minister for Magic himself have taken a personal interest in this unusuall matter.” Morbidus looked like he wanted to continue, but he too was interrupted.

 

“Which is why it was decided he would be given a little extra help now and then to meet the excellent standards we wish all of our students to achieve. He’s been with Professor Remus Lupin today, as you’ve no doubt heard. He has been able to help the boy enormously so far, as I’m sure you and the Minister will be glad to hear.”

 

“Quite, but it would be a terrible remiss on my part if I didn’t ask for proof regarding this, to settle Minister Fudge’s mind.”

 

“Well, there isn’t any problem there. We would be happy to show you proof.” Albus was a master at games, but that didn’t mean he didn’t have fun with them still. Dangling things for people like the inspector to snap at was an irresistible pleasure. “I will personally owl you his grade reports so that you can see where we have assessed him to be. You would be amazed at what we can do in such a short time.”

 

“I’m sure I would.” Morbidus looked like he was growing colder by the second, his eyes darkening to the depths of a Snape. “But would it not be more efficient if I were to personally meet the boy, seeing as I’ve come all this way already.”

 

“I wouldn’t dream of keeping you, my boy. You’re an important man at the Ministry and I couldn’t deprive them of your services for a mere triviality. I won’t hear of it.” Dumbledore had had his fun so he sent the intruder on his way. Albus would deal with Gaara himself, in a way he saw fit. He’d not had a full sense of respect for the government for a long time and the last Wizarding War had proven he was a better judge of character than a collective of politicians.

 

“Yes, yes, you win. I’m sure you’re right, so I will defer to you and eagerly await those results. If they do not continue their current outstanding improvements, I’m sure the Ministry will be able to take some measures in order to alleviate the burden on your staff. On a more sombre note, I’m afraid the dementors will have to remain indefinitely on the grounds of the school and they may have to alter their patrol patterns in the coming weeks to heighten the security. You will, of course, be notified in due time.”

 

“Thank you.”

 

“Now, I think I had better be on my way. It’s been a pleasure, Headmaster Dumbledore.”

 

“Please do visit again, Henrick.”

 

The inspector’s steps faltered just a mite when he heard the taunting old man disrespectfully use his first name. He would most certainly not be returning to the school if he could help it. Far too much hassle when he could have sent any number of his workers to investigate the dementors and the invisible boy.

 

As his spider-like legs climbed up the steep hill that led to the castle, towards the front gate out of which he planned to exit much like he had arrived, Morbidus mulled over how he would report his findings to the Minister. That Black, or some other entity, had been killing the dementors posted was troubling, but at least he could tell Cornelius that this ‘Gaara’ child, whilst suspicious in a number of ways, was not an immediate threat and so was unimportant enough to shelve until a later time when they could safely make contact to enter him properly into the bureaucracy. A task he would most certainly not need to perform himself. He could probably even get that insufferable Umbridge to do it. Anything to stop her going on about tagging werewolves and taking away merepeoples jobs or whatever she kept trying to pass in the Wizengamot.

 

Now that he was stood higher up on the hill, looking down on one side at Albus Dumbledore probably congratulating his oafish assistant-in-distraction, Rubeus Hagrid, and on the other side of the hill, right at the bottom where the grassy fields met the Dark Forest, he saw a class of young teenagers all huddling together unattended as two of them seemed to be having a rather violent argument. Looking closer, peering over his glasses and narrowing his eyes, he spied that one of the quarrelling children was a black haired child that bore a striking resemblance to the pictures of Harry Potter he’d seen on file. And the other was quite removed from the fairly typical looking students that were circling the heated discussion. The shorter of the two had blazing scarlet hair, was carrying a bag of some description on his back that was almost as big as him, and was completely silent.

 

All of a sudden, the Potter boy had apparently worked himself into a frenzy and pulled his wand before casting a spell at the red-head. Morbidus had little doubt that somehow the boy that he had been searching for all day had ended up right before his eyes, about to get cursed into next week by the boy-who-lived. The poor transfer, probably a muggle-born judging by his not drawing a wand immediately in defence, didn’t even try to dodge the incoming curse.

 

Morbidus had been watching the exchange with a smirk up until the casting, as it appeared the child was indeed just an inexperienced new student that just wasn’t on anyone’s record, probably because of an abusive household that resulted in the muting injury. Dumbledore’s obvious scheming could be chalked up to being paranoid. Nothing whatsoever to be concerned with in these dark times.

 

After the casting of the low-level curse from Harry Potter’s wand, his impressions and priorities radically shifted, as before his eyes, the boy who hadn’t drawn his wand or so much as raised a finger, somehow commanded what appeared to be muddy water or _sand_ to stream out of the bottle on his back and form a thick, unyielding shield to protect him entirely.

 

The fight soon escalated to Potter firing many spells uselessly against the shield that would block them from any and all angles before moving aside so that the child he believed to be Gaara could fire one or two significantly large and more menacing ones back. This cycle repeated for a while, and the strange part about the boy who controlled the sand with such ease and dexterity, other than that he controlled the sand, was that he seemed to have so little skill in his duelling abilities. His spells were unrefined, his wand work and casting were all sloppy and his form and stance were just wrong. But still, the boy looked almost bored, as the sand blocked every attack, even one that the defeater of the Dark Lord sent to fly around to hit him on the back of the head.

 

Henrick Morbidus gazed on in growing alarm and fascination, all without Dumbledore any the wiser.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Sometime before the disagreement had broken out, Lupin had been stood at the front of the crowd of students engaged in an entry-level discussion of what a few of the more diligent students had been learning so far that year whilst dodging questions about why he’d been touring the school with Gaara or who the tall scary man had been. Arguably the most diligent learner outside of Ravenclaw, Hermione Granger wasn’t at the front of the class talking to Professor Lupin like she might have enjoyed, instead she was taking a much needed rest alongside Harry and Ron at the back. Well, she deserved the rest, she wasn’t so sure about Harry and Ron should have been the first to try and engage a teacher willing to review some of the basic material they’d most certainly not listened to. It was a wonder that her ginger friend expected to pass with his lack of note taking or listening. It really was.

 

Hermione had been a little worried when Hagrid, who had been so concerned all term with appearing and being professional so that he would be respected as a teacher, was running so late to their class. She was beginning to wonder whether she should go and ask a teacher what was happening, even if she would almost definitely be hated by the rest of the slacking class of Gryffindors and Slytherins for throwing away their free period, when Professor Lupin of all people showed up, followed by Gaara. Lupin, after determining the situation had offered to take the class for a little while until Professor Hagrid returned, as he had no other burning commitments, which was odd as he kept glancing at a silver watch every few minutes as he talked.

 

Hermione couldn’t help but feel sorry for the prematurely aged professor as it soon became clear that he couldn’t hope to hold an engaging lesson so far out of his field of expertise, so instead he had drawn together some of the more interested students and was talking to them whilst everyone else hung around and held their own conversations. Hermione wasn’t interested in Ron and Harry’s discussion of the upcoming Quidditch season and the World Cup which would take place in the summer, so instead she surveyed the various clusters dotted around. Most of the Slytherins were huddled like penguins, only occasionally throwing out glares to everyone else. There were also a couple of other Slytherins in their own bubble, which she knew from experience were the ‘nicer’ Slytherins, the ones who didn’t curse as harmfully when they cheated and might not have held the same blood purist views. As far as she knew, there were even a few half blood and muggle-borns in Slytherin, which meant they were under constant threat.

 

As she turned onto a few Gryffindors who had sat down and pulled out a deck of cards, holding themselves tightly against the cold encroaching on them from the ground, her head did a double take that hurt her neck as he thought she saw something ludicrous in that last cluster. But lo and behold, the absurd and bizarre even in a wizard’s world did happen, as she saw Draco Malfoy standing amongst the nicer Slytherins. The foul boy who had previously been the leader in his own little clique of blood purists, even having goons follow him around, was now with the outcasts. Sure, she and everyone else had noticed that Malfoy had been spotted less and less with his usual friends, and Crabbe and Goyle had stopped hanging out with him ages ago, but the disparity had never seemed so clear when one of the malicious glares from the main Slytherin body was sent directly at Malfoy.

 

Hermione looked around for Gaara, who had approached with Lupin but had stopped short at the back with that same placid-borderline-angry expression on his pale face. She spotted him a little ways off, staring at the woods without blinking for longer than she could herself stare to watch, and she decided to try again to engage him. She had felt, ever since her, Ron and Harry’s ill-advised attempt to interrogate Gaara that night in the hospital wing, he had held a certain amount of enmity towards the three of them. It was difficult to be sure when the red-head treated almost everyone with that foreign sense of emotional detachment.

 

Even with this bad blood between them, Hermione still wanted to try and help Gaara integrate a little more fully into the school. She remembered her first few weeks at Hogwarts, when she’d been an outcast and a ‘know-it-all’, and she wanted to spare Gaara that. Even Draco seemed to have abandoned him, as their previous separation had entailed, and with this physical and metaphorical distance between them even now in this lesson, she saw that the time was right to move in.

 

As she took her first step, she heard a scream and a yell from the front of the class followed swiftly by the form of Professor Lupin holding Neville Longbottom and shouting to the rest of the class that he’d take Neville up to the infirmary and that everyone else was to stay exactly where they were until he came back. Hermione watched Lupin struggle to run with the considerable weight of a husky fourteen year-old in his arms up the hill, and she decided not to question what had happened to her housemate, so often did injury find Neville that doing so consistently was beyond anyone. Still, it couldn’t be a good sign that Lupin was taking the most direct and most difficult route to the infirmary.

 

It didn’t escape the brunette that when he was rushing away, Lupin had seemed to stress that _everyone_ should stay there. He’d probably meant Gaara, who’d been taken on a wandering lesson all day. Enough of Hermione was free of envy to question whether it had something to do with the inspector who had been making inquiries about the school and the new transfer student. Maybe the last two years of her eventful education was making her paranoid.

 

Interuption over, and everyone going back to their conversation as Harry and Ron made the effort to go to the front of the class to find out what had happened to Neville, Hermione continued towards Gaara who had taken a book out of somewhere and was reading it... quietly. Seeing him with books so often had, in some ways, convinced the fellow reader that Gaara might actually be a nice person, ignoring their first real encounter in the medical wing; and that all he needed was a chance to get away from all of those Slytherin bigots.

 

Despite her noble intentions and insistence as well as her attempts at breaching an agreeable topic, Gaara totally ignored her and her efforts. She only realised she was speaking to herself after five minutes when Gaara, who had been reading all this time, marked his place at the beginning of a new chapter and moved the book behind his back, under his gourd where he apparently kept a bag, and continued ignoring her by staring into space in front of him.

 

Any normal person might have taken this disinterest in conversing as a sign to give up, but being the hard-working Gryffindor that she was, Hermione drew upon the handful of sign language words she knew from when she was younger and had found an interesting book about it. Her conclusion was that the mute Gaara must have been offended all of this time that no one had tried to communicate with him through the proper language and had instead relied on his abilities with the sand, which must surely be tiring for him considering the weight of the sand and complexities of wandlessly and wordlessly controlling it to such a fine degree. If he was responsive, which in her mind was almost certain considering her flawless logic, she would get to studying so that maybe he could open up to her.

 

She walked up in front of him and apologised for being so insensitive, but he didn’t give any sign he’d heard, his eyes hadn’t even registered she was there. When she brought her hand up in front of her chest and made the sign for hello and sorry, Gaara’s eyes finally reacted by following her hands carefully and his eyebrow rising. She smiled brightly, believing she’d finally cracked him, but after a few moments when nothing more happened on either side, his eyes went back to their fixed stare at the horizon and she was almost out of ideas. There was only one thing left to do: get creative. After all, maybe all the lonely and vulnerable Gaara needed, seeing as he looked a little younger than he was said to be, was a hug...

 

Walking closer to Gaara, she circled him a little, looking for the best way to initiate the unsolicited and surely unexpected physical contact, and she decided just small hug from the side wouldn’t be too intimidating for Gaara. The mute Slytherin didn’t seem like he had received too many hugs before and she didn’t want to scare him off. He didn’t move a muscle as she came closer, and also didn’t move when her arms moved out in front and behind him. He didn’t even move a muscle when, as she tried to bring him into an embrace, she was met violently by a wall of sand that seemed to spring out of nowhere and push her back at least six feet and onto her back.

 

All the while, Gaara really hadn’t noticed any of it. He’d been in his head, trying to work out whether he’d remembered to sort the laundry he’d left in his and Draco’s room. He didn’t trust the House Elves to do it for him as they didn’t seem very bright and he didn’t want his shirt to get dyed accidentally. He was only brought out of his ponderings when he heard a loud shouting. The Jinchūriki was peeved to be distracted, as he’d already been bothered by that Gryffindor girl who walked out in front of him and tried to copy one of his hand signs, as far as he could tell.

 

“Hey, you jerk! Say sorry, right now!” Harry was fuming as he marched closer to Gaara who was still ignoring him and everyone else in the class who’d turned to stare at the boy when they’d heard and seen the wall of sand knock Hermione away from him. Ron was helping Hermione back to her feet, which were still fairly shaky after the unexpected aggression from Gaara’s side. She tried to explain that it was all really her fault and that she’d been too forward and had startled Gaara, but she was ignored yet again. “Apologise to Hermione, right now!” Harry screamed at Gaara, who’d finally turned to take notice of what was happening. The only reply he got was a non-verbal tilt of the head, signalling that Gaara apparently didn’t understand what he’d done wrong.

 

Harry became more fired up than he’d been in a long while at Gaara’s disregard of his friend’s safety and pulled out his wand. “You think you can do whatever you want because Professor Lupin has been giving you special treatment and extra help, but you don’t deserve any of it. God, you’re such an ass even your own House of snakes can’t stand to be around you! You had one friend here and somehow even _Malfoy_ , of all people, found you to be too repulsive to stand being around. And now you think it’s okay to just knock around my friend when they were trying to be nice to you?”

 

Though Gaara had turned to him, he didn’t take any more notice of what Harry was saying, instead he was wondering why he had sand out. Maybe Shukaku had repelled something and Potter had taken offence for some reason. That could be it. Still, when someone threatened him, with wand or kunai, Gaara didn’t take it lightly. Especially since this was the perfect sort of situation that Shukaku would like to utilise to take control if he wasn’t on guard. The shinobi didn’t trust whatever had happened to the seal to keep Shukaku at bay so he kept his guard up and took a hold of the sand outside and inside the container with his chakra.

 

At seeing no reaction still, Harry screamed and launched his opening attack at Gaara, following up and pair of smaller stunners to either side of the shorter opponent, sure in the knowledge that when Gaara tried to dodge his first attack, he’d be caught by one of the others. But then the sand sprung up almost too fast for his eyes to follow and blocked the centre spell. Harry brought his wand up again, but had to jump quickly to avoid whatever overcharged spell Gaara had seen fit to retaliate with. Fortunately whatever it was didn’t hit any students behind him. Gaara was a menace when attempting to do anything normal with magic, which just meant it was all the more perilous duelling against him.

 

Harry kept firing spells as fast as he could whilst running all around, even behind Gaara, looking for a weak spot in his impenetrable defence. Only one of Harry’s spells made it through the sand wall, having snuck past before the block had been completed, but Gaara had been able to deflect the tickling hex with his own wand before countering swiftly.

 

The duel was fairly short lived as Harry made the erroneous decision to move closer in order to heighten his chances to firing a spell through the sand defence that seemed to react even when Gaara was unaware. But when he was close enough, Gaara’s free hand shot out and made a fist, sending out a blast of sand thick enough to send Harry over onto his back before his wand was wrenched from his hand by the sand and dropped into Gaara’s own.

 

With Gaara’s wand pointed at the downed and unarmed Harry, everyone present held their breaths and waited. The winner slowly stepped towards the loser, his sand still coiling protectively around him as Gaara’s hand stretched out again, his eyes fixed on Harry’s spectacled ones. The sand creeped along the ground and then went up, covering the Boy-Who-Lived’s legs. Harry clawed furiously as the sand continued to climb, tightly binding him. As the sand cocoon reached his chest, making it harder and harder for Harry to breathe, he felt so afraid watching Gaara’s eyes widen and stretch, looking so angry at him.

 

Only when the sand reached Harry’s neck, did Draco shout, “Gaara, stop!”

 

The red-haired ninja seemed to snap out of his trance, his eyes lowering their intensity to their usual levels and his hands reached up to his head, clutching at his temples. Whilst he looked to be experiencing the mother of all headaches, the sand encapsulating Harry lost its cohesion and he was able to wriggle free and crawl away to where his friends helped him up.

 

Soon, Gaara’s grimace and clenched teeth disappeared and his hands dropped to his sides, where one made a small motion for the sand to return onto his back. He dropped Harry’s stolen wand and walked away in a daze. Gaara didn’t want to kill anymore children. It was common knowledge that shinobi killed from time to time for money, but he’d killed for fun, Shukaku’s fun, and he was a monster.

 

As Gaara wandered away, lost in the past, Ron and Hermione helped up their friend, but no one present knew what a miracle it had been that all Harry had received were a few cuts and scrapes. Hermione was apologising profusely for what she’d done, though she wasn’t too clear on exactly what it was, as she checked Harry over for any more serious injuries. Ron, on the other hand, was as furious as Harry had been, swearing he’d get that monster for what he’d done to both of his friends. All three of the trio were greatly disheartened at what had just transpired, as it went to prove that despite the recent lapse in Slytherin attacks against them from Malfoy that had lead them to hope that maybe things would change for the better, but now they knew that Slytherins really were all rotten. Even Hermione was struggling to see how Gaara could have meant anything other than to hurt her and Harry.

 

Draco, who was now stood away from the moderates, was also a little upset at events. Partly, the antagonist in him still wanted to see Potter in more serious pain, but the other part, the pacifist, was concerned about his normally placid roommate. He wanted to storm over to Potter and his ~~mud-b~~ , his friend and demand answers for what just happened to set Gaara off, but it was clear that the entire Gryffindor half of their class would swiftly attack given the slightest Slytherin provocation at this point, and it was unlikely that his old friends among the snakes would be forthcoming with their help in a fight.

 

It was more likely that the Slytherin side of the class would egg the Gryffindors on when it came to Draco these days. He was the second most hated Slytherin, after the obvious first. Fortunately he still hadn’t been openly called a blood-traitor, as word of such an insult would inevitably reach his father’s ears and then any howlers he received from his parents would seem like praise compared to the hell that would rain down upon him.

 

With nothing left to do and not being on the right terms to go after Gaara to help him, Draco walked back to his new friends who were markedly quieter around him now. It was becoming a belief around the castle, surrounding Gaara’s ongoing legend, that the only one that could control the savage demon was the one that had made a contract with it. People were saying that Draco had summoned Gaara in order to become the next Dark Lord. Draco actually laughed when he first heard about that, as he had briefly considered that application of his friendship with Gaara but had had to dismiss it completely since Gaara listened to very little of what he said. Nevertheless, this latest incident only further alienated Gaara and subsequently Draco from the other students.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Just as Gaara stalked away from the class he’d just terrorised, the device that tracked the remains of the dementors followed his movement and registered the small traces of the dementor dust inside the child’s gourd. Morbidus turned as he heard approaching footsteps coming down the hill, and saw a teacher he’d not yet seen in the castle, meaning he was presumably the Professor Lupin who had been aiding in hiding this strange creature all day long.

 

Lupin choked back a gasp as he returned outside to see the tall, straight-backed form of the inspector gazing intently at the retreating shape of Gaara down by the class he’d left only twenty minutes before. His steps slowed and his blood ran cold when the inspector turned to him and flashed a small smug smile and a curt nod in his direction. All of Lupin’s work to keep Gaara hidden and safe had been for nothing now.

 

Lupin stood before his adversary and couldn’t keep from sweating as he had no idea of what to do next. He couldn’t fight his way out of this, he couldn’t bribe or trick or persuade the inspector. He saw, from behind Morbidus, that Dumbledore was slowly making his way back up the hill towards the castle, and they shared the same distressed look to see Morbidus was still there, still displaying that triumphant smile.

 

When Albus arrived he wanted to ask what Morbidus had seen so that he could work out a strategy of denial or maybe even to pre-empt the report to Fudge by flooing him immediately to disclose some information, all he’d need to do was delay the inspector half an hour. But Morbidus stopped him short by saying, “Thank you very much for accommodating this most... interesting inspection, Headmaster. I’ll be on my way now.” He didn’t turn to look back nor did he slow his pace. It was as if he was trying to stop from skipping along with his giant legs, he was so exalted with his discovery.

 

He strode through the school with purpose, the small children having to rush to get out of his way, and as soon as he’d passed over the bridge and was outside of the wards of the castle, Morbidus apparated straight to the entrance of the Ministry, where he barged past the lines of employees trying to get into the building, scaring many of them with his mere presence.

 

The foreboding man strode straight into Cornelius Fudge’s office, ignoring the Minister’s secretary’s feeble protests, and demanded an immediate debriefing despite Lucius Malfoy sitting across from the Minister currently having a meeting. Insincerely, Morbidus apologised as Lucius was ushered out of the office. Once the door was locked and the standard privacy spells had been cast, the Head of the Minister’s Administrative Inspectors gave the report on his findings. He told of how the dementors were being killed and that Black was not the culprit, how this ‘Gaara no Sabaku’ had probably been responsible, that he probably wasn’t entirely human, and that this Gaara was definitely something to be concerned about.

 

Morbidus left Fudge’s office with the Minister himself holding his fat head in his red hands, and the beanpole of an official offhandedly remarked to Lucius that he should be more careful of who his son allies himself with in future if he was to remain in the Ministry’s good favour.

 

Fudge realised that his problems had now tripled thanks to this report. Not only was the mass murderer and Death Eater, Sirius Black on the loose after having slipped past the dementors in Azkaban, but now he had be concerned with this strange Gaara that had been allowed in Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Gaara was an enigma that the Ministry couldn’t allow. They had no records of him, they didn’t even have a surname to go on, just rumours of something along the lines ‘Sabakuno’, but that hadn’t turned up anything either. And most troubling of all with Gaara, his wand didn’t have the trace on it, as had been mandatory for all wands made for over four hundred years. Morbidus had been diligent to trace all of Gaara’s movements outside of Hogwarts, even to Olivander’s, before looking for the boy himself.

 

But even Gaara seemed unimportant in light of the biggest problem he now faced; Fudge could no longer trust his long time ally and confident Albus Dumbledore. If Dumbledore, the most powerful wizard still alive, was using the greatest magical school in the world to keep secrets from him at a time like this, then he was going to have one hell of a fight on his hands in the future. The Minister for Magic needed to take action, but even the inept politician that he was recognised that he couldn’t recklessly charge into this matter. He’d need to be extra careful on this.

 

He invited Lucius back in, but kept what he’d just been told to himself.

 

Things were certainly dire.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

By the following morning in the castle things were back to normal, for the students, at least. Gaara was suffering the dreadful nausea he had come to associate very closely with attending Divinations; however, the short bijū container had recently come to the wonderful solution that allowed him to nullify the worst of the tower’s aroma therapy stench by burying his nose in a cup of tea for the hour-long lesson. His plan, whilst a little distracting from whatever it was that he was supposed to be learning, did also have the added benefit of making him look like he was working hard to ‘gaze into the future’ with his ‘mind’s eye’ as he intently studied the bottom of his tea cup. Anything to distract Trelawney from giving him another worrying prophecy was a plentiful bonus.

 

On the other hand, after a few weeks, it occurred to the professor and the class that they hadn’t studied tea leaves since the first week and no one present knew where Gaara had gotten his cups of tea from. It was dismissed, though, as of all of the strange things Gaara had done, summoning a cup of tea from out of nowhere was really rather inconsequential.

 

During this lesson, they were supposed to be using Tarrot cards with the people they were sitting across from to predict their fates. As fate would have it, Gaara had been sat next to Ronald Weasley since Trelawney wanted to test Ron’s inner eye on someone other than the perpetually doomed Harry and the doubter Hermione. In the end, it seemed that Gaara had the same luck as Harry, as Ron kept telling him over and over that he was dead or going to die, usually with a menacing snarl or glare. It really didn’t make for good tea-time conversation.

 

After his tea and the lesson had ended, Gaara was walking down away from the Tower of Bad Smells, when he spotted Draco breaking away from the flowing mob moving towards the Great Hall. Gaara was grateful that he’d be able to sit down for peaceful meal without the looming sense of dread that emanated from the evil aura Draco had been cultivating the past few weeks. Little did he know, Draco had decided today was the day for his plan to finally be enacted.

 

In the Great Hall, Gaara was practically in heaven as he ate the gizzard dish he’d finally gotten around to requesting the night before. To tell the truth, Gaara was little surprised that the House Elves in the kitchens had actually received the note he’d left with his dirty dishes, but even more surprising was that they were able to read. He had wanted to go down to the kitchen to request some more home-like dishes, but every time he had gone down there for something to give to Fluffy, he had found none of the elves were willing to get close enough to him for a chat. Fortunately, the elves apparently still liked him enough to cook him his special dish... or they were _really_ afraid of him. Either way, it was nice to have a taste of home again.

 

As he snacked down on yet more of the chewy treat, an eclectic delicacy where he came from, one of Draco’s new friends began to zigzag towards him, looking about as afraid as he’d seen someone act around him in months. Apparently this boy, something Norbel if he remembered correctly, had been one of the more acutely affected witnesses to his sparring match with Potter the day before. Gaara had decided to call it a sparring match as he didn’t want to admit how close he’d been to killing the nuisance. Still, Gaara chomped down on his gizzard-on-toast slowly as he watched Norbel approaching slowly, as slowly as if he were approaching a wild lion. Gaara was half surprised the moderate hadn’t brought a first-year as a human sacrifice in case the red-head had been less than amicable.

 

Really, people were acting like he had actually off’ed the Boy-Who-Lived. He might as well have, with people acting the way they were, but it was probably a bit too late now to find Harry, kill him and claim he was just finishing off their fight. Still...

 

“Um, Gaara?” Gaara stopped looking around the hall for the Potter boy and his two friends and turned back to Roy who’d finally plucked up the nerve to come within biting distance, figuratively speaking. Gaara watched blankly for a few seconds and wondered if he was supposed to confirm that he was in fact the “Gaara” Roy had been looking for. Seeing as Roy hadn’t moved a muscle since his mouth closed, close to bolting, Gaara guessed, he nodded carefully.

 

At Gaara’s acceptance, Roy breathed out a little, trying to calm himself down.

 

Maybe Gaara was acquiring the reputation of being a budding Dark Lord, and that was how Volde-whatsit had treated his underlings, by killing them when they spoke out of turn? It just went to show how peaceful this world had been for the past decade, when Gaara hadn’t even killed anyone and he was still being treated like a mass-murderer. If only they knew the truth.

 

Gaara had to stop the smallest curvature of a smile from pulling at his lips at the thought of the pandemonium the truth would unleash, when Norbel moved onto why he had actually approached Gaara, which was probably quite important seeing how scared everyone was of him at the moment. “D-D-Dumbledore wants to see you. M-m-” If the addressee didn’t know any better, he might have thought Roy had been about to call him ‘Mister Gaara’. “He said to meet him by the big tapestry on the Fourth Floor. D-do you know where that is?”

 

The big, scary sadistic part of the shinobi considered ‘saying’ no, just to force the Slytherin boy to accompany him. Poor Roy probably wouldn’t have made it to the third floor before he wet his pants. But instead Gaara took pity on Draco’s friend and nodded and watched him back away slowly, never turning his back. It was only as he watched the retreat that Gaara saw that many people around him had seen the exchange and looked even more scared than before. Next thing he knew, Gaara was probably going to be called Dark Lord Sandimort. That was the last thing he needed, another ridiculous name.

 

As he made his way upstairs, giving up on the rest of his lunch after he’d finished his special requests, he wondered exactly what the headmaster wanted to say to him. It was obviously going to be in regards to the fight yesterday, but Gaara couldn’t fathom what the educator would want to say about the friendly little duel, seeing as no one was killed or permanently maimed.

 

As far as Gaara knew, which was admittedly as limited as the amount of people willing to tell him things, Harry and Hermione hadn’t had any injuries worth talking about after the events yesterday. Maybe Dumbledore had to give him a slap on the wrist, seeing as fighting wasn’t encouraged in civilian schools. But then, why hadn’t Harry been called up instead, seeing as he’d started it.

 

Gaara found the big tapestry quickly enough, which was to be expected with just _how_ big the thing was. It spanned the entire length of the corridor, running parallel to the windows, all except one of which were closed. The Jinchūriki wondered where Dumbledore was. It was terribly rude to invite someone to talk and then not show up in a timely manner. How was he supposed to learn a lesson about respecting the rules when the headmaster didn’t even follow basic etiquette?

 

Gaara stood by the open window, grimacing at the cold now chilling him to the bone but admiring spectacular view of the lake and valley. Even on a grey day like this one, Gaara thought Scotland was a beautiful place.

 

But then Scotland moved a couple of feet downwards and Gaara took a moment to reflect on why that was. Looking down, Gaara saw that the carpet he was stood on was now hovering steadily in the air, and suddenly his magical-aviaphobia flared into life and the well-honed reflexes and enormous power at Gaara’s disposal abandoned him.

 

Gaara felt paralysed as the jinxed flying-carpet flew up and out of the open window and through the clear air. Some kind of sticking charm stopped him from sliding off but that was little consolation as Gaara’s mind was filled with unprecedented panic. Gaara hadn’t been hurt a lot of times in his life, and even fewer times were those injuries anything serious. So his fear of flying magically was quite profound, as was his fear of lightning and lightning-cutters. If Gaara ever met a thousand chirping birds, he would probably have a strong aversion to them as well.

 

The enchanted carpet soared high in the air, swooping and diving. It completely escaped his notice at the time, but Gaara later heard that a sizable number of students had witnessed what was going on from the ground.

 

The flight lasted, thankfully, only a few short minutes, but to Gaara it could have lasted all day for how it had felt to him. By the time the carpet began to make its final descent, Gaara was close falling back into sitting, but his legs held out long enough for the carpet to dive towards the ground only pulling up in time to run parallel to it. Gaara was just about ready to summon the strength to jump off onto the ground, when he saw his carpet-ride was now above the glassy surface of the Black Lake.

 

The carpet stalled for one terrible moment, in which Gaara looked up and saw Draco sitting on the shore of the lake with that ridiculous, great big smile he’d seen on only one other blond in his life. Gaara called his sand out as quickly as he could, knowing for sure what was to happen next, but before he could make a stable platform, Draco’s wand, now in his hand, pointed downwards in a most sadistic motion. The carpet seemed to go slack under Gaara’s feet and then he was falling again, all of ten feet into the piercingly cold water.

 

The one solace, that he later recognised, was that his sand was spared as it was still floating attentively (mockingly) above the surface alongside the carpet that was dangling like the strings on one end had been cut.

 

Gaara burst through the top of the water, taking in a big breath and gasping in a silent scream at how cold the water was. He actually saw ice forming at the edge of the lake. The biting cold was only confounded when Gaara heard and saw the absolutely raucous laughter coming from his spectating roommate. The howling laughter only ceased once Gaara managed to pull himself on top of the water’s surface and began to walk along it like the scariest little messiah Draco had ever seen. Even the ‘miracle’ in front of him didn’t stop Draco from smiling like he hadn’t smiled in weeks.

 

Gaara walked atop the water, avoiding the icy lake and the admittance that he wasn’t a particularly strong swimmer, while his sand reformed his gourd and reattached itself to his back all without him making any gesture, so intent was he that he wanted to reach dry, stable earth again. Gaara continued walking, right up to Draco, until they were close enough for the blond to see Gaara’s miniscule shivers. The drenched part-time tanuki stood there for a little while; a lengthy pause to deliberate his response.

 

Sand flew out of Gaara’s gourd and Draco couldn’t stop himself from flinching until he saw that they were spelling out a message instead forming sharp tendrils to kill him, which he’d always assumed was a possibility.

 

The message read: ‘We are even now.’ With Gaara under it trying his hardest to suppress his shivering enough to raise his eyebrow and look as stoic as usual.

 

Draco slumped his shoulders, sighed in relief and confirmed that they were definitely even now and that he was glad it was over with. The dry Slytherin was readying to offer Gaara a little assistance up to the castle to get changed into dry clothes but before anything more could be passed between them, Gaara nodded at Draco in some unknowable benevolent gesture, and then _shunshined_ back into the castle and to their room. It would be so much easier getting changed now that Gaara didn’t have to dodge Draco to get back into their room.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

“How did this happen?” McGonagall was concerned to see just how worn out this whole affair had left Albus. As the headmaster had asked this damning question, his head was resting on top of his hands, meaning to look to his most trusted staff members like he was in deep concentration but Minerva knew that really Dumbledore just didn’t have the energy to sit up straight right now. Even if McGonagall had been walking up and down stairs all day, Albus had been performing countless spells to manipulate the castle’s stair cases and secret passages as only a headmaster could. It was at times like these that Minerva remembered that unlike her, Albus wasn’t just getting old, he was already almost twice her age.

 

“I’m sorry Headmaster. If I hadn’t left Gaara on his own, Morbidus wouldn’t have seen a thing.” Lupin was looking like the runner up in this contest of attrition, appearing to be stressed, probably having not slept the night before. And with the full moon approaching, Remus would be feeling this acute weight tenfold.

 

“I don’t mean to cast blame, I just-”

 

“Well, I _do_ wish to cast blame. Your failure had left one of _my_ students in the line of fire. Do you think Morbidus will leave it at this? This is only the beginning, and now he’s seen Gaara and seen what he can do, the flood if going to be at the castle’s walls in a matter of weeks, maybe days! Don’t say you’re sorry, it doesn’t mean a thing when you’ve already caused this much damage.” Severus wasn’t pulling his punches this evening, and with how angry he was, no one present felt it was a good idea to mention that Severus detested Gaara and that he had no right to be angry on his behalf.

 

“Hold on a minute there, Professor Snape,” However, despite it not being a good idea, Hagrid wasn’t one to drop a moral qualm, “everyone knows how you feel about Gaara. You don’t have the right to be getting angry at Professor Lupin here when he tried his best to help. Where were you when all of this was happening?”

 

“Enough! Severus, now isn’t the time for blame, Albus is right. We need to work out what the next move will be and how best to minimize the damage.” Minerva was in no mood to see her old students argue with kind Rubeus in the middle of their meeting.

 

“Thank you, Minerva. But the Ministry has already made their move. I received an owl from Cornelius this morning, notifying me that Azkaban are going to be assigning more dementors to Hogwarts in the near future, as a precaution against whatever had been attacking them, as well as an added measure against Sirius Black.”

 

“Do we know when these replacement dementors will be arriving?”

 

“I’m afraid it’s not as simple as that, Severus. The Minister feels that in order to ensure the safety of our students, he wants to increase the number of dementors guarding the school. He intends to have three times the current number guarding Hogwarts’ borders.”

 

“What?” Minerva looked aghast, “You cannot be serious, Albus. That many dementors here? What about Azkaban itself? Surely they can’t be intending to take away that many of its guards, breakouts will become a weekly occurrence.”

 

“I imagine they’ll leave a sufficient guard at the prison. The numbers will probably be made up of the other dementor colonies around the world that the British Ministry and the chiefs in Azkaban can control. Gathering that many won’t be easy, even for the Minister, but it’s probably his way of telling us that he’s stepping up the game.” Remus didn’t enjoy the prospect of that many dementors around, with Sirius so close by.

 

“You don’t mean to say that Cornelius intends to declare war on Hogwarts, do you?” McGonagall’s hand flew to cover her mouth, an uncharacteristic gasp showing everyone just how perilous the situation was. “They wouldn’t go so far because of one student, surely.”

 

“Professor Lupin is right,” As much as it pained Severus to admit it, “Minister Fudge is making his intentions known. This isn’t about one child, even Fudge isn’t so simple as to take such a gamble over any one boy, no matter how monstrous or obscure. His isn’t declaring war; he’s telling us that he knows we can’t be trusted, so he’s making this into our term-time prison, complete with guards.”

 

“That can’t be right. I know the Ministry sometimes makes mistakes, but there’s no one in the entire world that cares about the school more than Professor Dumbledore, they know that.” Hagrid looked either angry or confused, it was often hard to distinguish the two where the half-giant was concerned.

 

“Fudge doesn’t care, and neither does Morbidus. They now know that Albus and the rest of the school are keeping secrets, and after the last few years at this school, those secrets are clearly not ones to be scoffed at. Morbidus is a veteran, and he sees any kind of mistrust as the enemy. And we all know how paranoid Fudge has been around Dumbledore thanks to those silly rumours about Albus running for Minister of Magic. We are most certainly not at war, but the eyes of the Ministry are now firmly on us.” Severus knew enough to be as worried as Minerva and Albus.

 

“But that’s okay, isn’t it. It’s not like we’ve got anything to hide, right?”Hagrid was looking around the room, trying to see agreement and not finding it.

 

“Rubeus, I’m afraid there are a number of secrets, among other things, that Hogwarts holds that should be kept out of the hands of politicians, chiefly the futures of our students. I’m afraid there isn’t anything else we can do for the moment other than to teach our classes, run the school and try our best to remain calm. This must, under no circumstances, reach the ears of the other staff members or, even worse, the students. We must show Cornelius that this school’s absolute concern is for the students within its walls, nothing more and nothing less.”

 

And suddenly it occurred to Lupin and Snape why Gaara had been admitted to the school. Both of the men had puzzled over this conundrum for the past two months as it just didn’t make any sense to them. To admit a strange student into the middle of his education without knowing a thing about him... it was to protect him. Lupin felt a wave of relief wash away some of the doom that had been lingering thanks to this conversation. Severus felt more annoyed than relief, as he still couldn’t see the purpose to caring for some disturbing little magical creature (nothing like Gaara could be a full-blooded human).

 

The two hopelessly trusting men came to the wrong conclusion as Albus moved on to less problematic recent events, namely why he had seen the subject of their latest problems, Gaara, flying out of a fourth floor window on an illegally imported magic carpet.

 

The staff members briefly discussed the prank but all eyes turned to Snape when Lupin asked whether Gaara had taken any moves towards revenge. They might have to move the student to a new school for his own safety. But Snape said that as far as he knew, things were going smoothly, and Gaara had even moved back into the dorms instead of sleeping rough. Minerva was upset that one of the students had been camping out in the classrooms all this time, but relented when Remus said Gaara’s friendship with Draco was probably best left unprobed.

 

No one mentioned them outright, but all thoughts of the culprits were naturally directed at the Weasley Twins who had been out of control this year. They weren’t mentioned out loud because there was no evidence for the accusation whatsoever, and none present could quite figure out how the austere Weasley’s had managed to save up enough money to buy a magic carpet on the black market.

 

Snape later tried to recall where he had heard the black market being mentioned a few weeks ago, but soon dropped the thought as none of his Slytherins would possibly sink so low as to perform practical jokes, and on their own housemate, no less.

 

The twins for their part had been gobsmacked to see Gaara, the scariest student in Hogwarts, and recent defeater of the defeater-of-You-Know-Who, being flown around on a magic carpet before being dunked in the lake. McGonagall had taken housepoints from them when they’d stood up the middle of her class and began applauding out the window. Minerva for her part had had to pretend that she hadn’t seen a thing, in order to bring her class in line. But this whole event had left the twins a little out of sorts, as it was a prank that they just couldn’t replicate. Not only were flying carpets incredibly expensive (and they had to prank within their means) but Gaara was a psychopath and they weren’t willing to make a target of themselves to upstage the mystery prankster. They’d have to find some other way of retaking their place at the top of the school’s most wanted list (pinned to Filch’s door despite requests by the staff to stop criminalising students).

 

At the end of the meeting, Albus held Severus back a few moments to talk with him, “Severus, I wonder if I might make a request of you?”

 

“What is it, Headmaster?” Severus droned out, never liking this vein of conversation. It never boded well for him when Dumbledore asked him for anything. He had scars that he could attribute to favours he’d given, and god forbid Albus ever repay him for them...

 

“I want to discuss your readmitting Gaara into your Potions classes.” Snape opened his mouth wide, ready to shout his refusal to the heavens but he was stopped when Albus raised his hand to finish what he needed to say. “With Gaara’s progress in mind, I believe Potions is the only class that Gaara hasn’t had an opportunity to improve in. Surely you can’t bar a student from learning when they clearly still have so much to learn and a willingness to do so.”

 

“You don’t know the damage that boy has brought about in my classroom since the term began. He’s set fire to the stones of Hogwarts, for Merlin’s sake! And besides that-”

 

“I am well aware of your feelings regarding Gaara, but putting personal grudges aside, this is a school, Severus, and like or not, you are a teacher. It is your duty to impart your knowledge onto each and every one of the students that pass through these halls.” Albus was getting desperate, resorting to beseeching Severus on behalf of the Slytherin’s pride as a teacher.

 

“Very well. I will let it return to my class on the condition that I be allowed to remove him permanently if he causes any more danger to the others in his class.”

 

“We will discuss it if the occasion arises. Well, I am very glad that you have seen sense, Severus. I’m sure you will soon see why all of the other teachers have begun to sing Gaara’s praise lately.”

 

“We’ll see.” ‘You meddling old coot.’

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

As the war council in the Dumbledore’s office was winding down, in the Slytherin dormitories, Draco was catching up on some of his long-neglected correspondence. Gaara was asleep in his bed on the other side of the room and even in his sleep he looked fittingly happy to not be sleeping on his increasingly uncomfortable (improvised) _sand bed_ technique. Now, Draco knew Gaara didn’t necessarily _need_ sleep, so it just went to show how happy the racoon-impersonator was, that Draco had been forgiven so readily.

 

The real wizard didn’t see why his roommate couldn’t express any of his emotions... at all, really. He knew excess emotion was suited for the lesser houses, but Draco couldn’t remember if he’d ever seen Gaara even smile and he’d definitely never seen Gaara laugh, hell Draco couldn’t even imagine his impossibly stoic friend chuckling. It was actually quite the scary thought.

 

And Draco didn’t need another reason to be afraid right now, so he stopped trying to picture Gaara exhibiting emotions like a normal person. He’d cast his most powerful silencing spells and wards around the room’s writing desk, just so that whatever he’d been ignoring in his post wouldn’t wake up his slumbering housemate. He would hate to wake up Gaara, for Gaara to do something impulsive, and ruin their status quo again. And quite apart from that, he didn’t need his friend hearing what his irate parents had to say to him. Some things didn’t belong in the ears of a teenager’s friend’s ears, even if Gaara wasn’t exactly the type to tease.

 

Draco picked up the earliest letter he had stacked and slid his silver, Malfoy-family-crested, jewel-embossed letter opener along the seam and pulled the parchment out. Sure enough, the dark green ink was styled in his father’s overly elegant script, but at least it was a relatively short communiqué.

 

_‘Dear Draco,_

_Your mother and I have been waiting these past few days for your weekly owl but it seems that you’ve become so distracted at school that you have forgotten your duties beyond the walls of our house. You had best write as soon as you receive this or there will be dire consequences in line for you._

_In your letter, I want you to tell me some more about your new roommate, Gaara. I gather he is something of a mystery but I want you to tell me everything you know. There have been some discrete inquiries floating around as of late and as the father of this Gaara’s roommate, I have a right to know about him, not to mention that it is expected that I know. If he is a mudblood or some no name half-blood, worry not; I am on the board of governors and I will have him expelled from Slytherin if need be._

_On an assuredly separate matter, I want to know what has happened between you and the Crabbe and Goyle boys. Their parents have been begging my forgiveness for some_

_slight I might take over you falling out with them. Whatever has happened, I trust you will have fixed it by the time I receive your reply. I understand associating with those simpletons is troublesome but as you grow you will understand more just how necessary their protection is._

_Begin writing your report immediately._

_Yours sincerely, your father,_

_Lucius Brutus Malfoy,_

_(Head of the Pure and Powerful House of Malfoy)_

_P.s. Your mother sends her regards.’_

 

Well, that hadn’t been as bad as he’d feared, though Draco wasn’t looking forward to openly refusing his father’s order to re-befriend Vincent and Gregory. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t tried early on, at least, but they had seemed terrified of him, or more likely terrified of Gaara. They were unnaturally scared of his roommate before it became cool, so perhaps Lucius would allow him to forgo keeping the Crabbe and Goyle families on side in favour of something else. Maybe he could convince his father that Gaara had taken up the post, as he was pretty sure Gaara was stronger than both the henchmen-to-be put together, and his father would never accept that Draco had an actual ‘friend’ in the more traditional, Gryffindor sense. Frankly, Draco found it hard to grasp at times.

 

As much hope as he had been granted by the leniency in that first letter was soon turned to despair and doubled when he saw how many more weeks of letters there were to follow, including a fair few with noticeably more feminine handwriting on the addresses. That meant his mother had also gotten involved.

 

Of course, Draco had known his mother had sent him letters, probably a few of her own brand of howlers, but in the brief moments of reading his father’s business-like letter, he had foolishly allowed himself to forget.

 

He carefully used his letter opener to crack the wax seal on the back of the envelope this time, not willing to test what happened when you opened a howler the wrong way. Fortunately his mother’s first letter was somewhat less furious than he had anticipated. In fact, the entire letter really boiled down to how angry his father was, how she was beginning to worry, and wanting to know how he was doing. Oh, and she was also curious about Gaara. Who wasn’t?

 

The following pile of letters was akin to reading through a timeline of his father’s temper, followed soon after by one of his mother’s worry turning to indignation and then too to anger. Repeatedly they threatened to come visit or even to pull him out of school. His mother mentioned that she might as well have sent him to Durmstrang if he was going to ignore her owls anyway. His father had also apparently been in contact with the other pureblood families attending the school, and had clearly broken the nib of one of his priceless antique quills when he’d stabbed out his letter regarding Draco being accused by the other Slytherins as a blood-traitor and for allying himself with the moderates. If he looked closely, Draco thought he could tell where in the letter his father had stopped writing to abuse the new house elf before continuing.  But all the while, despite the occasional furious blot, his penmanship was exemplary. They just didn’t teach that at Hogwarts anymore... shame.

 

At one point, his mother had even said that even though the Dark Lord had never broken into Hogwarts, she might well do it herself if he didn’t answer soon.

 

The last letter was even more troubling as his father and mother had turned to a cold rage in their joint message, as apparently that scary inspector he’d disrespected had told on him to his father. And with the inspection regarding Gaara having been so high-profile and unsuccessful, both now wanted answers regarding his roommate. Draco swore his parents had forgotten there was a mass murderer trying to get into Hogwarts and a flock of Dementors flying around the grounds. That wasn’t to say he’d be reminding them, as that would almost certainly lead to his mother making good on her threat to have him transferred to another school.

 

He’d been reading these upsetting missives for over two hours, not to mention listening to the threatening howlers, and was already awfully tired, but Malfoy knew that he needed to write back soon. Dumbledore had been steadfastly blocking his parents’ attempts at visiting Hogwarts for one reason or another, but Draco couldn’t rely on his good luck to last for much longer, not when that meddling quack of a headmaster was at the helm. He’d write it now and then send it off first thing the next morning.

 

_‘Dearest father and mother,_

_You have my most sincere and remorseful apologies for my discourteous silence these past weeks. Inexcusable that this lapse in judgement has been, I hope you will find it within yourselves to allow me to explain myself in spite of my trespass._

_I will immediately assure you that I am otherwise well and unharmed, barring my distress as having you caused you so much anguish with my thoughtlessness. The reasons for not having replied in a proper and timely manner to your letters, inadequate though they may be, are due to my intense focus on the task I have taken upon myself. After you expressed your concern over my new roommate, I knew that leaving such a gap in our family’s knowledge would be even more grievous and so I began to get closer to him and investigate him and his origins._

_I have worked for the past month trying to gain his trust and his friendship in order to discern whether he is a fit ally for our noble family, having already established his utility in the form of his clear strength and intellectual prowess._

_Of course, I was able to earn his trust swiftly; and I have discovered that Gaara is a refugee from a faraway desert wizarding community, but that he is strictly a pureblood of the greatest degree, according the community’s isolationist customs. He moved to Britain following a civil war within his tribe that left him as the sole survivor, albeit with his voice cursed beyond repair. His ways are indeed strange and he is not accustomed to using magic in the proper British manner, though I am glad to inform you he is learning. But, most importantly, he is strong. Just the other day, he was able to best Potter with ease in a duel using only his brute strengths, not needing to plot to ensure his victory._

_With these strengths and his estrangement from our society, I have taken it upon myself to teach him the proper wizarding customs to rid him of his silly foreign ones, and in return he will suffice perfectly as a replacement for those cowardly Goyles and Crabbes who broke off our agreement of their own volition (without any input on my part)._

_On the subject of those ludicrous accusations of blood-treachery, I trust you will see past the envy of those foolish peers of mine towards my claiming Gaara as my ally, manifesting their families’ envy for our great legacy that far surpasses any of theirs. My distancing from them is purely for the sake of strengthening my ties elsewhere, sure in the knowledge that they will undoubtedly regain their sense when I see fit to deign their presences around me again. The moderates within the great House of Slytherin and their families are an untapped political well of power that I will be the first to exploit among my year group, as I am sure you understand._

_The inspector you mentioned did see fit to approach me during his visit, but I made no untoward move against him or toward the Ministry, as he has obviously implied. I simply re-established our standing ties with the Ministry but denied him any of my findings regarding Gaara, as it was not his place to try and ferret information from me when my first allegiance is to my family. I will leave it to your discretion, father, whether you see fit to share any of this with the Minister or keep it between us in order to maximise Gaara’s usefulness to us._

_Now that my initial investigation is complete, I will be resuming my proper weekly reports undisturbed. I will leave you with my reiterated apologies._

_Yours sincerely,_

_Draco Abraxas Malfoy_

_P.s. I trust both you are both doing well in my absence despite my recent wayward behaviour.’_

 

Ninety-nine percent lies, but his parent probably wouldn’t find that out for a while, and by then there will hopefully be something more important happening to distract them from killing him. He thought the history he’d invented for Gaara was quite good. He might have to tell Gaara about his tragic past if Draco’s parents were ever to meet him. But then, it’s not like Gaara would be quick to correct their assumption regarding him, worst came to worst, he’d just bat Gaara’s sand out of their air before he accidentally told the truth.

 

He folded the parchment and cast the wax with his precious customised seal before placing it atop the pile of books he’d be carrying to his lessons the next day. While they weren’t much good for conversation, Draco did miss his old henchmen and their reliable offers to carry his books for him. The blond wouldn’t dare ask Gaara to do it.

 

He turned off the light as climbed under the covers, remarking silently to himself that even Gaara’s sleep-deepened breathing was totally without sound also. The pale red-head was practically a ghost, though Draco could only wish for the ghosts to be as quiet as his roommate.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Draco talked sedately to Gaara as they got ready for classes that morning, holding his one-sided conversation so fully that he could almost have forgotten that he wasn’t getting any replies. The only responses he might get were Gaara occasionally glancing up at him before continuing with his own preparations again. As dense as Draco could be around friends (perhaps narcissistic is closer), even he might have considered whether he was forcing Gaara to listen to his unending talking.

 

Without any answers or real responses, Gaara might well have been completely ignoring him the whole time, waiting to finish his own preparations before ditching his annoying roommate. Draco’s neuroses didn’t usually stretch to this kind of depressive rumination, but with Gaara, socialising wasn’t a given, especially after nearly a month without any sustained human contact that Draco was aware of. But lo and behold, as Draco was finishing up packing his quill and ink into their case, Gaara stood there and waited for him! Gaara even followed the blond all the way up to the owlery so that the Malfoy could attach his letter to his somewhat neglected eagle-owl.

 

It was lunchtime that same day that Draco received his reply. The owls were only supposed to come in the mornings and the students could then trek up to the owl tower if they were expecting anything in the evenings, but Draco, being the scion of the most respectable pureblood family in Hogwarts, was exempt from such paltry rules as far as he could see. There was also the fact that both McGonagall and Dumbledore hadn’t been in the Great Hall at the time, and Lucius really did believe his letter was of such dire importance that the lesser rules of the great wizarding institution shouldn’t hamper him, and so he had told Draco’s ill-tempered owl to go straight to Draco and not wait around on its perch all day long.

 

A few heads turned when the single owl swooped into the hall and dropped the letter into Draco’s lap, with expert accuracy, before banking around and flapping back out of the same window, not having landed once. Even Snape gave Draco a withering stare at the blatancy of his flaunting the rules and Draco had the good sense to sweep up his message and exit the Great Hall looking as if he had just received an order from the Minister himself, not from his parents telling him off for not telling them he was okay for a couple of weeks.

 

Not for the first time, Draco wished he was in Potter’s situation, never needing to negotiate these difficult family relationships. Of course, these feelings were strictly fleeting and would never ever be voiced. Plus he had added benefits, like parents and endless monetary resources...

 

And he didn’t have to wear glasses.

 

As Gaara followed Draco back to their room, apparently having nothing better to do during his lunch break than to spend some ‘quality time’ with Draco, the taller of the two looked to Gaara and wondered what his father was like.

 

Draco, along with a few others that witnessed Gaara’s encounter with the boggart, gave serious consideration to the woman that Gaara had impaled being his own mother. Of course that raised many more questions, but Draco could swear he’d seen Gaara’s face in the woman’s. But, seriously worrying mother-son relations aside, it also raised the question of Gaara’s dad. What sort of man was he? Was he around when Gaara was growing up?

 

Gaara was first and foremost a mystery, but the Potter-proclaimed-‘ponce’ wouldn’t be so intrusive as to question Gaara about his family. Not after his roommate, hours after spearing the woman’s visage, returned to their room even quieter than the mute boy was given to being and sporting red raw eyes. No one saw Gaara cry that night, but one person had had to pretend he didn’t know that it had happened.

 

They reached their room with half an hour before their next class began so Gaara moved over to read, standing up. Gaara’s ability to stand still for long periods of time was just one more reason why he was a singularly unsettling person. Especially since Draco knew how heavy that ‘gourd’ was and that Gaara didn’t always use his ability to lighten the load.

 

While Gaara read from one the countless books he had borrowed from the library since arriving, having finished all of the required reading materials that had been purchased for him in Diagon Alley, Draco sat back down at his desk and opened his missive. It was comprised of two separate letters:

 

‘ _Dearest Draco,_

_I was very reassured to receive your letter this morning, and to that end I will shortly forward it to your father at work so that he may share in my relief. I am pleased that you are thriving, and your friend Gaara sounds lovely. We will have to have him around so that you can introduce him to the family._

_I cannot immediately speak for your father, but your slack communication was a thoroughly heartless move and I trust you understand the pains it has put us through. Nonetheless, as you seem to have been anything but idle in that time, I will not pursue any punishment for when you return for the winter holidays, but I cannot say for sure whether or not your father will feel the same way._

_You will resume your regular letters from now on, otherwise Albus Dumbledore will not stop me from personally marching into Hogwarts and removing you by force. It is not unprecedented for Malfoys to be homeschooled and I will not have you disappear from your family like my ‘notorious’ wayward cousin did._

_Be cautious of the dementors and I will hear from you again soon._

_Love,_

_Narcissa Malfoy_ ’

 

‘ _Dear Draco,_

_As your mother has stated, your lack of decorum is reprehensible in and of itself, not to mention the worry it has inflicted on us, but I will allow you to forgo punishment in this matter in reward for your diligence in pursuing our family interests. This Gaara is a promising ally and you acted astutely in reserving your finding for my ears before divulging them to the Ministry._

_Your mother has suggested to me that Gaara join us for the winter holidays, provided he doesn’t have any other engagements, so that we may take his measure personally and further introduce him into our family’s circles. You are to extend our invitation at your earliest convenience and forward his answer quickly. You have found a precious tool in your work, as no other families are working to curry his favour. I was astounded by your progress after hearing from multiple outside sources that he did indeed best the Potter boy in a duel with ease. Such a feat is nothing to be scoffed at._

_I will continue to make my own private enquiries regarding what you’ve told me, so that I may solidify our new ally’s place in our society. There are several groups looking into this child’s past and not all of them have his best interests at heart as we do._

_Continue with this work, and do not let your grades slip below those befitting someone of your standing. Also be on the lookout for Sirius Black as no matter what affiliations he may have had, they were beyond top secret to everyone and he is likely to be a dangerous lunatic after being in Azkaban for so long._

_Yours sincerely, your father,_

_Lucius Brutus Malfoy,_

_(Head of the Pure and Powerful House of Malfoy)_ ’

 

Draco would have to think on having Gaara stay with his family. It was a daunting prospect for both of the teenagers, especially with how uncooperative Gaara could be when he wanted to. But then, it actually saddened the manipulative teen to think of Gaara spending the Christmas break all alone in the freezing cold castle when most of the Slytherins would be gone... well, the stoic transfer student might actually prefer the peace and quiet, but Draco couldn’t possibly imagine that it was healthy for someone like Gaara to go so long so frequently without any social interactions. He’d end up killing someone, surely.

 

Frankly, that Gaara hadn’t killed anyone by now was the really weird part.

 

He looked at their clock and reviewed his next class’ assigned chapter, knowing that the old salt McGonagall wouldn’t let him slip by if he hadn’t memorised the chapter be the time he went in there. All because he’d transfigured Weasley’s chair into a giant, orange coloured, wooden rat.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

The next day was a much anticipated lesson for many of the Slytherins and Gryffindors, as never had anyone seen Snape so angry as when he’d announced that Gaara was to be readmitted to his classroom. And then there were the numerous hilarious accidents Gaara had incited, although those were more appreciated by the Gryffindors because of their senses of humour and because they didn’t have to sit next to the disaster waiting to happen.

 

Before Snape had opened his door to allow them entrance, the long line of students conversed quietly about Gaara and his latest escapade into the lake. Ron was the focus of the conversations as he swore that his brothers hadn’t had anything to do with it, or so they vehemently had protested. Many pointed fingers at countless potential pranksters, but no one suspected that Draco, talking to one of his moderate-friends, was really the mastermind, except perhaps Severus who knew better than to involve himself in Hogwarts’ age-old tradition of pranks. He had scars from previous pranks he’d been involved in, and not all from the Whomping Willow or the Marauders.

 

One thing that many in the discussions agreed upon was that with no one having been killed or even attacked in retaliation, somehow Gaara had forgiven the perpetrator. Either that or he didn’t know who did it, but very few within these conspiracy circles were rational enough to consider that was Gaara human enough not to instinctively know who had wronged him.

 

As a result of this passivity on the Jinchūriki’s part, Gaara-fear was at a low within the school, though that obviously wasn’t going to last long. 

 

The door to the Potions room eerily opened on its own, Snape having apparently used his magic to freak out the front of the queue a little before he got his sadistic fix for the day. Everyone filed into the darkened laboratory, with Gaara bringing up the rear, having resigned himself to isolation for the lesson. Not all of Gaara’s accidents were malicious attempts at Snape’s life (and that was him being modest), so he thought it best not to work too close to his friend and roommate. Instead he sat himself down behind the Golden Trio and the rest of the Gryffindors, not quite appreciating that in this world, beating up a person wasn’t forgiven in a couple of days. Gaara wouldn’t have believed Draco if he’d told him that such non-existent injuries could be the cause of a longstanding hatred even when the losing party had started the fight.

 

Harry just seethed at the next desk in front whilst Hermione tried to calm him and Ron down before the two hardheads sprung backwards and tried to double-team Gaara.

 

In regards to the lesson itself and the work handed out, Gaara did exceptionally well considering his track record. As it turned out, his independent learning despite the lack of practical experience had allowed Gaara to excel in the short time he was away from the Potions classes. He was almost to an acceptable level by most standards, barring his actual potions making skills which were still comparable to Longbottom’s, but even that was still a great improvement. The burn-removal potion he was brewing didn’t harm anything or anyone and caused almost no damage to the classroom, except a little staining to the stonework under Gaara’s desk. It was a personal best for the inept novice magician, even if it wouldn’t help anyone with burns and might in fact cause burns when applied topically.

 

However, in spite of Gaara having almost reached the level of Failing rather than Burgeoning Terrorist, it made no difference in Snape’s eyes. Further to that, he saw Gaara’s improvement in his absence as a personal insult to his teaching skills, as if he took such _pride_ in teaching Potions. With this in mind, he spent most of the lesson sniping at Gaara and calling him on any error he spotted with his eagle eyes, and some that he didn’t spot.

 

After the potions around the room had been bottled, except the failures from Longbottom, Crabbe & Goyle, and Gaara, as the students were writing up their work, Severus walked around the classroom until he was at the back of the lab, right behind where the most detested red-head in Hogwarts was sat writing. That Gaara didn’t tense up or show any visible sign of acknowledging Snape’s hate-filled presence behind him fuelled his prejudiced anger and he waited there, looking for any tangible excuse to release what he’d been wanting to say to Gaara since he’d been forced to readmit him to his classroom.

 

The excuse that was given in the official report sometime later in Albus’ office, after the relevant parties had been checked over by Madame Pomfrey was: cheating. Gaara had looked over to the other side of the room, where Draco and the rest of the Slytherins were, and Severus could only come to the conclusion that Gaara was trying to copy what his housemates had written, even if it wasn’t a test and his targets were on the other side of the darkened room.

 

With every bit of acidity he could muster into his tone, Snape spoke evenly, “Is there no level of ineptitude that you are unable to sink into, you miserable excuse for a monster.” It was the soft brutality of the words that caused even the spiteful Gryffindors in front of Gaara take pause and subtly turn their ears to the diatribe, except for Ron who was trying to find a clear route to the door from where he was sitting. He had the right idea.

 

“I do not know what prompted you to join this school, I can’t help but blame myself for bringing you to the headmaster when I should have sent you in to the Ministry for them to lock you up. You have no place around these children because I know what you are and so does Professor Dumbledore. We can see it in your eyes, that darkness. Because we’ve seen it before in the murderers and monsters that we’ve met and fought, and _they_ _pale_ in comparison. That’s how we all know what you are and what you are capable of.”

 

Everyone in the room had given up the thin pretence of subtlety and had turned fully to watch the rampage at the back of the room that was giving any other rant from Snape a good run for its money in terms of sheer spite. Draco, who had never considered getting in the way of one of his Head of House’s attacks before, was beginning to as he watched Gaara’s eyes widen and his brows crease. Gaara was a strong person, and he didn’t seem all that emotional, but his armour had chinks in it and Snape was jabbing his knife in all the right places, if Draco was right.

 

“Didn’t you think it was odd that everyone in this school is afraid of you? Of course not, you knew it would happen because that’s where you came from. Some wonder what happened to you before you got here, but I think it’s obvious: they were trying to rid the world of an abomination! But they just sent you to us instead.”

 

Through this uncharacteristically brutal verbal attack, from the already acerbic man, Gaara had become perfectly still, holding the same understated look of pain on his face that very few would recognise as he received these words. It was only when Snape had brought up his home that Gaara had finally turned his head to look upon Snape in the corner of his eye.

 

Almost as if reacting to seeing Gaara’s face, the snarl on Snape’s own face became feral and his eyes lit up with rage unsuppressed for the first time in years. Nothing would stop Serverus’ wrath this time, not one of his preferred students, Draco, jumping up and calling out for him to stop, nor the students standing from their chairs and backing away from the scene he was making. Nothing would stop him from expressing his anger, well... one thing did when he reached the climax of his uncommonly cruel and excessively personal denigration.

 

“I can’t imagine how your family would cope with a cruel imposter of a good human being. They were probably the ones that made you darken _my_ doorstep. Is that why you attacked that Boggart?” Instantly Draco took a step forward and called out again urgently just as the rest of the shocked classroom compelled their professor to cease his vocal breakdown. “You killed it because you knew it would reveal the truth, that you are a monster and an outcast! Who was she, your mot-”

 

Snape was cut off by an inexplicable sense of dread that shivered down his entire body and sent him into a cold sweat before he could identify where this terror had emanated from. The momentum from shifting so quickly from rage to fear was dizzying, so it took the veteran wizard a few moments of his eyes darting about the room looking for whatever his senses had seen fit to warn him about so strongly before he came back to the red-haired, green-eyed boy he’d just been attacking. Those eyes that blurred when he looked directly at them, those eyes filled with all too familiar hatred rather than the pain they had been displaying guardedly before.

 

“What are you?” Snape moved back a few paces and snapped out his wand, meanwhile the rest of the class began to feel the same sense of unknown dread wash over them like a heavy tide, the malicious chakra and killing intent being expressed in these inexperienced children simply as a paralysing panic, a strong desire to run and hide but simultaneously an inability to move a muscle. The only exceptions were the only two who had experienced this exact sensation before, and both Crabbe and Goyle fled the room without any by-your-leave, not stopping until they almost bowled over Professor McGonagall. By the time they’d reached the door of the Potions lab, Draco could have sworn he saw tears in more than one eye, but his own eyes soon darted back to the tense standoff where Professor Snape was still pointing his wand at the seated Gaara, who still wasn’t fully turned towards the instigator but was glaring back at him with as much loathing as Draco thought any person was capable of possessing.

 

Snape’s mouth opened one more time, gaping rather than to continue his verbal volley, and that was when all hell broke loose, along with a demon, it would seem. Snape had been staring into Gaara’s eyes the whole time and in the instant after his mouth dropped open, those hauntingly green eyes flickered into something _wrong_ , something inhuman. And in that very same instant, a wind began to tear around Gaara and Snape fired off a stunner as fast as he could. It was forbidden for him to curse a student, but this wasn’t a student, it was plain for anybody to see.

 

This initial attack prompted the cork of Gaara’s gourd to explode and a shield of sand to race out and protect its master, deflecting the spell away harmlessly. Snape moved back even further, putting some distance between him and the ‘boy’ who, with the decrepit manner and speed of an inferi, had risen from his stool to face the instigator with eyes of a demon in intensity but not form, it would seem. The sand continued to flow until eventually the gourd itself crumbled and joined the rest forming fragments of a shell around Gaara.

 

“Call back your sand now, Gaara!” Snape was worried, sweat forming on his forehead as he felt just how enclosed his dungeons were, and with all of the children there he was very concerned. He had no idea how Gaara’s powers would hold up against his own, but the monstrosity still staring unblinking at him had apparently made short order of Potter the other day and his own spell hadn’t made so much as a dent in that defence.

 

Gaara gave no sign of abiding with his professor’s demand so Snape allowed himself the briefest of peeks around at his students, from Draco to Potter and his friends before he called out for everyone to hear: “Run! Get out and don’t stop! Class dismissed.” It was dramatic, but Gaara wasn’t even in whatever passed for a right mind, and Snape had made his severe doubts about Gaara’s moral compass known to all so he truly believed the teenagers under his charge were in danger.

 

The students closest to the door, in the other corner of the laboratory, began to sprint out, fearing either their angry and insane Potions professor or their deranged and erupting peer would give chase.

 

The tense standoff, with Snape not sparing another glance around the room, between the staring foes went on for centuries as the students manoeuvred around the room to get to the exit without passing too close to either. Not soon enough, the only students left in the class were predictably the Golden Trio and Gaara’s own compatriot, all four having decided to meddle in this affair as they were wont to do, only recently in one of their cases.

 

“What are you waiting for, get out, now!” Snape resharpened his focus and aim on Gaara’s torso, readying to fire off a curse at a moment’s notice.

 

“Gaara, what are you doing?! Calm down, it’s alright.” Draco was a few feet behind Gaara but had dared to come a lot closer than the others who had elected to wait nearer the front of the room as spectators for now.

 

The sand twitched and Snape sent an exploding curse at Gaara’s body and conjured a thin stream of super-heated flames towards his head soon after. The barrier of sand lazily rose to intercept the first attack and was ready to catch the fire, shifting the sand around so that none of it could melt into glass like Snape had planned.

 

The room wasn’t well ventilated so keeping up that fire might have been just as costly to him as to Gaara so he readied another series of exploding curses, but he had to sidestep the sand as it speared where he had just been standing. He severed it and fired off his own attack before ducking clumps of sand that instead impacted hard on the back wall.

 

“Gaara, stop, please. It’s not worth it.” Draco hadn’t moved a step closer since the battle really began, he looked desperate, but whether that was for Gaara’s of Snape’s safety no one could be sure.

 

Snape cast his very own _Sectumsempra_ repeatedly, slashing wildly at Gaara’s sand, hoping to cause enough damage to the boy himself so that he’d be incapacitated quickly enough that Snape could counter it and stop it from killing him.

 

The invisible sword was able to keep Gaara’s sand from advancing but he couldn’t penetrate the stone barrier that was erected every time he attacked. Shifting his stance he transfigured a nearby desk into a large snake and had it approach Gaara but without even looking, Gaara sent his sand to crush it, not leaving enough of an opening that Severus’ inbound stunning spells and crippling curses could pass through.

 

Ducking under a wide swipe, Snape summoned as much water as he could draw from the nearby taps and sent that as a malleable stream towards Gaara, intending to either surround the boy’s head with it until he lost consciousness or else soak this loose sand until he could out manoeuvre it. He couldn’t anticipate that Gaara had experience with this trick and had developed a defence against it, so Snape was dumbstruck when the shield that blocked the aquatic tentacle had deflected the water and allowed it slide off its smooth surface before breaking back up into grains of sand. Each time Snape tried to send water to attack Gaara, the shield would compact and harden to the degree that it was no longer porous.

 

Snape wasn’t a young man any more, he had aged prematurely so he wasn’t nearly nimble enough to compete with this sand on any kind of physical level, especially since the tiny space he had to work with was littered with debris and desks, and the longer he fought the more the sand circling Gaara spread out to surround him.

 

The veteran was getting to the point of desperation where he began to consider using his more powerful, darker and more dangerous spells and curses, on a different level than his favoured _Sectumsempra_. What stopped him, really, was the presence of those incorrigible students stood so close to this escalating battle. If things had continued as they were, Snape would have had to consider using one of the _Unforgivables_ to fight with. They carried immense risks but their power was the reason the Dark Lord had treasured them so.

 

Things, however, did not continue as they had, as through the door strode Albus Dumbledore with his wand drawn looking to be incredibly angry, compared to his famous granfatherly smile that twinkled around his beloved students. Gaara seemed to register this threat only after Dumbledore had sent off a nameless spell that froze the top layer of the sand shield and dusted Gaara’s sand-covered hair in ice.

 

Even as Professor Dumbledore began to send off spells in rapid succession in tandem with Snape, once Gaara had shifted his stance to face both his opponents, he was still able to fend off all but a few attacks cast at him, and the paltry handful of hexes that made it past the shield only came to impact on Gaara’s stony skin as if they too had been blocked.

 

The three passive spectators at the front of the room, who had never seen either professor duel seriously before, couldn’t believe that they were earnest in their attempts to subdue Gaara, and in fact they weren’t. As strong as Gaara was, they were each accomplished duelists and had the potential to rise to much greater strengths, but both were aware, on a deeper level, that Gaara was a student and they couldn’t think of going all out on someone under their care.

 

They reached an impasse as the teachers could not force their student into submission without probably seriously harming him and the other students in the small room, and Gaara couldn’t defeat his two opponents in his frenzied and wild state of mind, relying largely on instinct. As the battle lulled into a continuous attack and return between sides, Draco could stand still no longer. It was obvious Gaara would be the one to get hurt if things went further, so he slid forwards.

 

Seeing that Draco was making his move, Albus formed a wall of water to act as a barrier long enough to stop this fight. With the sand struggling to push through the surging shield of water, Albus walked over to Severus in order to calm down the adrenaline fuelled duellist on his side of the conflict whilst Draco took the unenviable task of undoing whatever rage the Potions master had driven the red-head into.

 

Moving closer to the action was perilous for anyone, but Draco hadn’t even drawn his wand, he couldn’t ward off Gaara’s rebounding attacks after they had impacted on the wall of water and they hurtled towards him. Again and again he was knocked back, to the point where even his enemies behind him called out for him to give in, but he didn’t.

 

For the first time in his life, Draco Malfoy didn’t give up when things got too hard, he persevered and pushed on until he reached the edge of Gaara’s absolute defence. The floating fragments of the sandy egg shell seemed to hesitate as his pale hand reached out to the paler shoulder of his best friend.

 

A flinch that could only be felt and not seen passed up to Draco and he squeezed the robed shoulder and said, “Gaara, it’s over, calm down.”

 

Gaara barely spared him a glance before sending out a wave of fresh attacks, but as he continued to attack, his assaults on the water shield began to weaken him as minuscule traces of water seeped into the super-condescend sand.

 

The Jinchūriki’s brows were still furrowed in silent pain and (perhaps) unshed tears. The attacks slowed, becoming almost petty and half-hearted from Gaara’s now waning anger more than any affect the water was having. Eventually the sand stopped pounding on the so-far impenetrable wall altogether and flopped onto the soaking wet floor, to be followed immediately by the water from Albus’ spell, once the wizened, battle-scarred wizard was sure the diminutive demon-host was finished.

 

Meanwhile, Dumbledore had been able to persuade Snape to lower his wand, and what had previously been a basement brawl between pupil and teachers was now the awkward silence after a temporary truce has been reached.

 

Now that all was quiet and peaceful, Gaara lazily raised his hand, flat, and called together his soggy sand, as slowly as he could so as to not alert his one-time foes. The sand moved haltingly and struggled to lift into the air, dripping water all the while as it floated together into the shifting approximate form of a sphere and subsequently began to extricate the water it had absorbed. The process was so mesmerising that Draco almost forgot he was still holding onto Gaara’s skinny shoulder, and wanted to let go but held on for a little longer. He wasn’t one for physical affection, nor was he an affectionate person, and Gaara sure as hell wasn’t either, but this contact had gone some way towards bringing his friend back from wherever he had gone in his anger so he would wait a little longer.

 

Eventually the sand had returned to a useable state and had reattached itself to Gaara’s back. Gaara stared at his feet in shame, reflecting on losing control like he had and at striking out at civilians like... like a monster.

 

Harry, Ron and Hermione hadn’t moved more than an inch between them so far, and even after the fighting died down they didn’t want to draw attention to themselves. They weren’t sure what to be more amazed by: Albus Dumbledore and Severus Snape, both reputed duelling masters and respected teachers in their fields, etc., engaging in a fierce battle with their enigmatic transferred peer; or that Draco Malfoy, the most cowardly snake in the entire school, had been the one to face up to the danger and put an end to the fighting by approaching his psychopathic roommate. They weren’t just speechless, they were shell-shocked. And they were tired. The stress of the battle and the intangible killing intent that had assaulted all of them before had drained even the casual observers present.

 

Even after personally witnessing everything that had just happened, the three still couldn’t believe that Draco had changed so much so rapidly under the watch of this new influence. It was eerie.

 

But apart from Draco, Gaara looked more damaged by all of this than anyone would usually have the right to be. It didn’t seem to be about what Snape had said to set it all off, either. Gaara was looking ashamed of his actions, which the Trio could understand, but then they had been working under the assumption, at least since Harry’s fight with him, that Gaara was some kind of violent crazy person just waiting for an excuse to start something. And with his ties to Slytherin and Malfoy, that had seemed like the most feasible possibility, but now they got a glimpse of something more; evidence that there was more to their odd new peer than fighting and Slytherin... though of course this isn’t to say that any of them were any closer to liking him or even any further from disliking him, it was just the seed of a thought.

 

Primarily, Harry’s thoughts were centred not on Gaara’s newfound penitence like Hermione’s were, but on the potential issues arising from Gaara’s amazing strength and apparent lack of control. Sure, even Ron pitied the sad visage that was repentant-Gaara, but Harry had to focus on the danger that this boy posed to his friends and his school in an already dark year.

 

A part of Harry had honestly believed that with the escape of Sirius Black, his third year at Hogwarts might just be a little dangerous and troubling. Just a single problem for the teenager instead of the usual plethora that he’d come to closely associate with his true home at the school.

 

Instead he got an escaped mass-murdering convict hell-bent on killing him, dementors with a Boy-Who-Lived fetish, a weird not-prick Malfoy, and the creature formerly known as Gaara.

 

...He missed the basilisk...

 

Hermione, Harry and Ron were eased out of their individual trances by Professor Dumbledore who guided them firmly to the door and asked that they go rest for a little while and to please keep what they had just seen to themselves for the time being, even though everyone was sure to know about it by dinner that night anyway.

 

Once the Golden Trio had been sent to their dorms to tell all their friends about what they had just seen, Albus moved onto the next step of damage control and gave Snape the rest of the day off and sent him too off to his quarters to relax for a while, if Severus was capable of relaxing. He’d have the House Elves clean up the mess in the Potions lab. Asking whoever was sure to be on Snape’s detention roster for that evening to clear the battle ground was beyond whatever sadistic bone lay dormant in the kind headmaster’s body. He’d also have to have someone round up the straggling students who’d fled the Potions class just now. It wasn’t beyond many of the students to use the panic caused to avoid going to their next classes.

 

 “Gaara, I believe we need to have a talk in my office;” Dumbledore’s eyes bore down on Gaara’s fluffed red-head, taking charge now that the conflict had been resolved, before he turned slowly to look upon Draco who had since taken up position next to Gaara at a respectable distance, “Mr Malfoy, would you please join us, I’d like to hear your input as well.” Draco understood that he was to come for emotional and psychological support for Gaara who was still in deep meditative thought, or was still contemplating the state of his shoes. In any case, the platinum-blond agreed it would be best if Gaara had a friend in what was yet to come. It didn’t take genius to know that a meeting with the principal, after attacking that principal as well as a Potions teacher and destroying half a laboratory in the battle, would not be a pleasant meeting at all.

 

Albus left the dungeon first, without looking back for any further acquiescence, and Draco was about to follow when he noticed his friend had stirred from his trance, so he moved a little closer, though refrained from touching his friend again lest Gaara lose whatever tolerance he had for such contact and do something regrettable to the blond, and said the first thing that came to mind, as he had been doing a lot recently: “You aren’t a monster, Gaara, and you’re not a freak either.”

 

Fortunately that seemed to break whatever spell Gaara had been in as the red-head finally broke eye-contact with his toes and looked up at Draco, watching steadily before nodding forwards, gesturing for Draco to lead on, though Draco liked to think somewhere in that vague gesture had been a recognition of his efforts for Gaara. Who knew with Gaara...?

 

When the two third-years exited the Potions lab, Dumbledore picked up the pace and began walking in earnest to his office, looking forward to a nice cup of tea when he arrived. It was at times like these, among increasing others, that he was harshly reminded of his age. Even the climb through the castle to his beloved chair was sure to wear him out, but Fawkes would soon stop answering his calls if he tried using him as an in-school apparition tool... again.

 

On the silent walk, the Headmaster began to consider what he was going to say and, more importantly, what he was going to do. He had been worried, maybe even afraid, of Gaara since he’d laid eyes on him in August, but he truly had not believed that something like today’s incident would have occurred, or at least certainly not so soon.

 

Albus had dealt with more troubled students than... well, than un-troubled ones, sadly; but even his worst failures had never done something like this. Or, rather, none of them had put up such a good fight, and he couldn’t fight the feeling that that hadn’t been Gaara’s full power; he hadn’t even been using magic to fight, either.

 

He had to draw himself out of his head as his thoughts were becoming more and more disturbing, and he had to say the password to open the stairway to his office. Soon the three of them were comfortably sat in his office, all holding their cups of sweetened tea and occasionally taking sips, except for Gaara who was still staring blankly at something or other. Plus Gaara hated such sweet tea.

 

“Mister Malfoy, would you be so kind as to tell me exactly what happened in there?”

 

“Well, I don’t know, I just didn’t want Gaara to get into any more trouble or get hurt so I...” Dumbledore held up his hand with a smile, trying not to distress the witness before he continued.

 

“Could you tell me what started this all? I need to understand what set off this... outburst.”

 

As Draco relayed how Professor Snape had been tormenting Gaara, worse than **usual** , and that had led to things being said, about which he refused to elaborate, that caused Gaara to get angry. Then the weird fear-wave spell thing and then Snape fired off the first hex and Gaara fought back. Albus had a few reservations believing some of this, and he definitely needed to know which straw it was that broke the camel’s back, but he’d seen how outspoken Severus was about Gaara so it was possible that what Draco had said wasn’t all too far from the truth. And besides that, Draco had always been a preferred student in Snape’s eyes and wasn’t likely to make up stories to get the Head of Slytherin in trouble without good reason.

 

“Do you have anything you’d like to add, Gaara, to what Draco has just said?” Both he and Draco stared at the brooding monsterling only to be disappointed when Gaara didn’t look up to meet their gazes and continued to stare at his cooling tea and shook his head gradually, as if he was mulling over the question.

 

Dumbledore sighed, “Frankly, I am disappointed in you, Gaara. I know it must be somewhat confusing being thrust into a new school, especially one where you continually find yourself singled out because of the differences children often find reason to focus on, and Professor Snape’s behaviour has been unprofessional in his dealings with you, but the way you reacted today was wrong. I allowed you into Hogwarts so that you may move on from your past and make a future for yourself, but with your recent fight with Mister Potter and now with Professor Snape, I fear for the safety of the other students if things continue on as they have.

 

“In light of your conduct, but taking into account the provocations and instigations from others, you’ll be serving two weeks of detentions, which will be with Professor Lupin, but more importantly, I have to ask that you no longer carry your sand with you, except for a small amount so that you can communicate as you have been.” By now, Draco looked a little shocked by the leniency and Gaara had finally deigned to raise his head to look at his judge.

 

Dumbledore bore his hardened eyes into Gaara’s, needing to gauge the reaction he’d receive. The headmaster had considered something more drastic than confiscation, like a runic sealing to put a stop to Gaara’s unusual free manipulation of the sand, but he could never get Gaara to agree to something like that and it just wasn’t in Albus to force a student into such a drastic measure, even after all that had happened now and all that had come to pass in his tenure.

 

The sand rose and spread into the increasingly legible sandwriting, ‘I will leave if I am disallowed from carrying sand.’

 

Draco’s face far outdid Dumbledore’s, with his shock letting his jaw actually hang and his eyes widen to comical proportions. He’d expected a harsh punishment, and had been relieved that the headmaster had decided to be so uncommonly lenient with Gaara, but now his closest (and first real) friend was threatening to leave the school, an act that Draco had never ever contemplated before. For the first time he wasn’t always afraid, and now the one that had helped him reach this state might be forced out into a country that he was totally alone in.

 

Draco immediately jumped to his feet in defence of his friend’s continued education and boarding at the school, “Headmaster, you can’t be serious! Gaara protected himself both times, so without his sand he’d have been hurt much worse.” Gaara seemed to have reverted to his usual unflappable demeanour as his invisi-brow didn’t even twitch towards a rise after yet another emotional outburst from Draco.

 

Gaara was surprised the blonde’s floodgates hadn’t opened yet. Who would’ve thought, under all that pomp, snobbery and bigotry was an emotionally vulnerable boy? Gaara wouldn’t be surprised to find his roommate whimpering in the first-floor girls’ bathroom one of these days.

 

“I understand that, Draco, but Gaara’s sand is simply too dangerous should he lose control again.”

 

“And you’ll let him leave the school with nowhere to go if he won’t give it up, sir?” Draco had almost forgot he was openly arguing with the wizard revered as being on par with the Dark Lord, not that that fact tempered his defiance any.

 

Dumbledore wanted to see some open remorse or some input from Gaara, but he gained no reaction from humouring Draco’s desperate protestations. Truly, Albus had hoped that Gaara would show some kind of sign that he was bluffing, that he was afraid to go through with this threat, but Gaara had no such reservations. He was deadly serious about leaving Hogwarts if he was called to give up his personal sand. If anything, leaving might allow him to move around in the Wizarding world more freely so that he could explore some less travelled paths of research to go home. Gaara had no intention of fighting to stay, if his hand was forced, but that didn’t mean he was blind to the difficulties that expulsion would surely bring about.

 

The office had lapsed into an uncomfortable silence, for non-battle-hardened Draco at the very least, and each of the three took turns staring at one another before then switching on to a new target.  Eventually, Albus closed his eyes deeply and sat up a little straighter to address both the precocious teenagers. He wasn’t quite as imposing in stature or presence as he once was, but Albus was greatly aided by the fact that both Draco and, even more so, Gaara, were exceptionally short for their ages and allowed him to tower over them even at his considerable age.

 

“Well, I can’t very well be seen to expel such a promising young student because of my own inflexibility, so I will allow you to continue carrying your sand for now, Gaara, on the condition that in future you remain calm when someone tries to provoke you. There _cannot_ be a repeat of today’s incident.”

 

How pathetic, a child had called _his_ bluff and he had caved. Dumbledore wasn’t about to let Gaara run off into the world, it would defeat the entire reason he had invited the boy to attend Hogwarts in the first place. He would have to believe in the Malfoy heir’s ability to calm Gaara’s calamitous wrath, as well as his own ministrations to keep Gaara away from anything that might cause persistent agitation. No need to stir the hornets’ nest again.

 

Gaara didn’t show it, but he was a little relieved. Having to leave would have been troublesome, with finding a place to stay and means to indefinitely sustain himself as well as maintain connection with the wizarding world in order to continue his search. And leaving Draco would... be a shame? Something along those lines. His relief was cut short with a ice-bath of cold sweat when the headmaster added that all of his detentions, which would be with Remus, would be from now on every night except for the night of the thirtieth. Draco didn’t see anything wrong with this ‘prior engagement’, but Gaara had marked down that date already as the night of the full-moon!

 

No one should know about his transformation, not even Lupin or Sirius, so why then was he being allowed off for that one night. Looking into the old man’s eyes yielded nothing but joviality at giving such a lenient and sparing punishment to Gaara and giving him the night off instead of giving him over to Minerva or one of the other willing senior staff.

 

“I also want to award twenty points to Slytherin, for your steadfast courage and dedication to your friend, Draco. Hopefully it might go some ways towards counterbalancing what I am sure is a considerable number of house-points that Professor Snape has undoubtedly removed by now.” Trust Severus to finally remove points from his own house only when he has an axe to grind with one of the students.

 

“Thank you, headmaster.” Secretly, Draco was more than a little embarrassed at receiving house-points for ‘courage’ of all things. He wouldn’t be able to hold his head up around his peers if this got out. He was already on thin ice in Slytherin. And Potter and his cronies would have a field day if they found it he had one of the infantile Gryffindor characteristics. Thank goodness that the awarding of house-points wasn’t publicised at all. He’d just tell everyone that it was for his cunning and ambitious... something or other along those lines, he’d work out the details later on.

 

“Now that we’ve dealt with this unpleasantness, I wonder if I might ask you two about something that’s been nagging at me the past couple of days. Would either or you be able to tell me what happened two days ago, as I happened to see someone that looked remarkably like Gaara here being flown out to the Black Lake on a magic carpet. I needn’t remind either of you that such an enchanted carpet is illegal, but perhaps you could tell me what happened.”

 

Draco looked very unsettled for a few beats whilst he searched Dumbledore’s expression for any kind of anger or reproach, but seeing only mirth he swallowed his fear and smiled a little, “Well, sir, it started with a boy, let’s call him Kaara for now, accidentally almost killed his roommate , Braco, through sheer thoughtlessness. They didn’t speak for a while, but eventually Braco decided that he could even the status quo by evening the score and pranking Kaara. Long story short, an illegally smuggled carpet and an open window along with a well placed sticking charm solved their problem. All has been forgiven and forgotten. I’m afraid, though, sir, that I can’t tell you the real names of the two involved.”

 

Despite the laughter that Draco shared with the head teacher over his largely harmless crime, Draco did allow his eye to check whether ‘Kaara’ had appreciated this retelling as much as the whimsical headmaster. He began to sweat when he didn’t see any reaction from his roommate, and he dearly hoped that he hadn’t just inadvertently fired off the opening salvo in another conflict.

 

Even Albus Dumbledore, having lived through many wars, practiced and taught miracle-making for decades and had born witness to countless awe-inspiring sights, was as surprised as the fresh-faced teenager opposite him when Gaara’s mouth, that had so long been set in a perfectly straight line, curved upwards slow as can be and then... and then opened and laughed!

 

And the minute shaking of Gaara’s shoulders and his eyes closing in gaiety was a sight to behold, coupled with the quiet, rapid wheezing that might have been raucous laughter but for lack of those pesky vocal chords. Going from homicidally angry to totally shame-faced and now to being giddier than anyone in that world had even seen Gaara, it was a vision indeed. The red-head only stopped because he noticed that the other two in the office had ceased their talking and were just staring open-mouthed at him. As if they’ve never seen a serial killer laugh before.

 

“Well, yes, I’m glad that all of those troubles are over with now. I think, in future, _Kaara_ should bear in mind our school’s pertinent motto: ‘Draco _Domiens Nunquam Titlandus_ ’, you never know what you might awaken.” Draco tittered at the Latin joke, but Gaara’s otherworldly linguistic luck apparently didn’t extend that far or he’d expended all of his laughter for the year. “Now, I think I’ve held you long enough. I don’t want mean to spoil the mood now that it’s back to a proper Hogwarts standard, but nor do I want to mislead you as to the seriousness of what has transpired today. This will not happen again; is that clear, Gaara?”

 

Gaara nodded to that question in an eerily similar fashion as he had to his father’s same orders just a few years ago. ‘Don’t kill the villagers, Gaara.’, ‘Stop murdering my shinobi, Gaara.’, ‘Stop dripping blood all over the floor, Gaara.’ It was like white noise by now.

 

“We’re sorry for the trouble, headmaster.”

 

“I’m sure Gaara feels the same. Have a nice day, Draco, Lily.” Dumbledore’s cup of tea paused on its way to his mouth the moment he realised his tongue had slipped unforgivably. He swiftly continued on his sip and tried not at look either of the boys in the eye as they both stopped in their tracks. The glare sent his way from the red-head was pretty justified but he just continued to pretend to be intently fascinated by his work until this threat passed.

 

Draco looked back at the headmaster he’d just been leaving to his work, wondering whether he had actually just heard the old man call Gaara something along the lines of ‘Lily’, but convinced himself he must have been hearing things when his roommate continued onwards at a typically inhuman pace out of the ornate office. Draco spared another look towards the headmaster working hard and a glance at the phoenix he’d heard of, perched and preening itself happily.

 

Draco chuckled to himself as he descended the perilously steep stone staircase behind Gaara, finding the idea of anyone calling Gaara a girl’s name silly. Gaara would be homicidal, for sure. Besides that, what possible reason would there be for it. Maybe one of the loud noises from the assuredly-legendary-by-now battle earlier had damaged his ears. He’d go talk to that incompetent medi-witch tomorrow about whatever had been done to him. If she valued her job, she wouldn’t dismiss his injuries again, forcing him to contact his father for outside medical attention.

 

Potter may have broken his wrist or vanished the bone like an idiot last year, but he’d come off his broom in that match and Pomfrey had had the nerve to tell him was fine after a single diagnostic spell. There wasn’t anything really wrong with him beyond a few bruises, but how could she have possibly known that for sure?

 

A few hours later, after classes had finished for the day and the bravest Slytherins, amounting to three or four, had finished mining their resident Gaara-expert for details on the newest hot topic around the school, Marcus Flint approached the quietly studying pair sat on the sofa with his trademark scowl being marred by the presence of his horribly protruding buck teeth poking out.

 

Flint, who, in addition to being the Quidditch captain since he joined the House team after a tragic hexing accident with the previous captain, also happened to be Slytherin’s current head boy, was often loathe to perform his duties. There was a very minor scandal that arose when Flint was appointed as head boy because it was suspected by some of the other senior staff members that Snape had not taken a lengthy look at his students and chosen the most appropriate, but had in fact instead just picked the only student whose name he’d already memorised from being the Quidditch captain.

 

“Gaara, you don’t go to Potions anymore, and stay at least twenty feet away from Professor Snape at all times, understand?” Gaara nodded and went back to his book, and Flint offered his minimal greetings to Draco as he stalked back to whatever hole he had crawled out of, to finish his own homework.

 

The next day, Gaara spent the time that was supposed to be allotted to him and his year group for Potions class instead performing some extracurricular, but no less pertinent, research. He’d only gone to a single Potions class in the whole of this month anyway, so the timetable change was more rectified for him than disturbed, but for some reason the regularity with which the young student spent his time in the library during teaching hours didn’t deter the resident paper-weight/librarian from questioning him every time he walked in. He’d sneak in, but that sent his mind spiralling down to that one story he’d been told about a certain **someone** who used to sneak into the library to rearrange the books and make loud noises. Gaara’s pride was under constant threat in this world and he wasn’t about to forfeit a major part of it by using his training to avoid a snooty librarian.

 

That being said, he didn’t have the same compunctions about darting into the Restricted Section of the library to access the infinitely more advanced and interesting materials that he was bafflingly barred from reading. But he’d never let silly things like rules and laws stop him in his native world and he certainly wasn’t about to now.

 

He spent this particular hour searching for works on the demons of this world and any dark teleportation magics, but once again after the better part of an hour he found almost nothing at all. There were a few dark spells for transportation, but none of them were what he was looking for, unless he wanted sacrifice ten virgins to reduce the disorientation from _Apparition_ (he’d later admit that he had briefly considered tapping into the unused resource of first years to forgo that unpleasant experience again). As for information on demons, that was harder to pin down in such a limited time period as it seemed there was an extraordinary amount of fiction and religious material related to them, but nothing concrete or credible. And those demons were very different from the kind he knew all too well.

 

Maybe demons, like shinobi, didn’t exist in this world.

 

His frustrated reading only lasted the first of his two free hours before he dumped his books onto the nearest trolley and decided to go and see his surrogate pet out in the forest. Fluffy, of course, was ecstatic to see him and happily let the small red-haired boy sit atop his aptly named fluffy tummy, where Gaara then started on reading an interesting book on abnormal wizarding diseases. Medicine, in any form, wasn’t a particular passion of his, but Gaara was interested enough by the peculiarity of these illnesses that he didn’t mind. He’d already read all of the materials from the first, second and this year’s curriculum so he needed a break from the standard books he had been and would have been assigned if he’d been present.

 

Gaara figured he’d finish all seven years worth of material by the end of the teaching year. He’d heard it was quite common practice in Ravenclaw to do so by third year and Hermione Granger was also on track to do so. Bookish though he may be called, especially by his layabout roommate, he didn’t regret going back and reading over the previous two years that he had missed. It helped enormously with his theory work, but sadly it had little effect on his spell-casting. It seemed _that_ problem was just something he’d have to learn to deal with in time.

 

His reading was disturbed only when the massive dog rolled over onto his side and sent Gaara at least six feet before a pretty soft landing on his sand. The dog had the cheek to look over at him whilst lying on its shared back, tongue lolling out, and to wag its tail and shake its body as if expecting a belly rub.

 

It was only because Gaara had been in a good mood the last few days (other than his little tantrum yesterday) that he did give the soft, fluffy stomach a little scratch until he had to return to the castle. Damn beast was incorrigible.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

The supplementary lessons that Gaara had been attending had to be cancelled as the administering tutor had another commitment imposed upon him, which was just as well since Gaara’s detentions meant that he couldn’t attend the tutorials with Lupin anyway, as he had to go to detention with Professor Lupin.

 

It was held in the same room and it was largely the same atmosphere, as Remus helped him to improve his practical magic and he tried not to blow up furniture or his professor any time he heard that bloody **nickname**!

 

While initially admonishing Gaara for his rampage that had lead to their time together being reclassified, he did understand how hard it could be sometimes to abide by people who repeatedly tried one’s patience (Sirius came to both of their minds).

 

Soon Lupin’s manner had been swapped for concern over Gaara’s wellbeing as he had fought off not one but two infamously strong wizards and no matter how strong a third-year he might be or how easy the two teachers might have been going on the child, it would be highly irregular if Gaara had come out of the fight totally undamaged. But Gaara insisted that a trip to see Madam Pomfrey would be a needless inconvenience and that he was plainly fine to see, which Lupin had to admit seemed to be the case. In fact, Gaara appeared to be in a much better mood than he had been in weeks, which Lupin secretly attributed to boy’s recent reconciliation with the Malfoy boy.

 

Each of their lessons together over the nights that had been mandated as their ‘detentions’ went as slowly as before, with Gaara making no miraculous leaps forward in his magical abilities.

 

It was on one of the last nights before the full moon that the two of them got to ‘talking’ somewhat more frankly than Gaara was oft to do. Lupin had been talking about his past exploits like he liked to do, reliving happier days, when he came to the subject of his childhood experiences away from the Marauders and Hogwarts.

 

Now, Lupin wasn’t going to tell Gaara about his lycanthropy but he believed he could talk around it without giving too much away.

 

Truly, telling Gaara about the wolf inside scared Lupin more than perhaps was usual for him in revealing the truth to someone, and it wasn’t simply because Gaara was a friend. It was because Gaara would almost certainly not react normally. The boy, wherever he had come from, didn’t share the same prejudices and understandings of wizarding culture and so he might not fear a werewolf because he had never been taught to. What scared Lupin out of telling his newest friend about the beast was the possibility that Gaara would have a basal fear towards the wolf, that he might hate and flee from Lupin for what he actually was rather than through ignorance. That sort of rejection was so much worse in his mind, to be seen as the monster he sometimes was.

 

Remus talked about how he had been hurt terribly as a child and how he had not been able to see or talk to anyone his own age, and how he had almost not been allowed to go to school because of certain prejudices and concerns but how Dumbledore had helped him. He tried to focus as much on how he had felt as a child, alone, to avoid the glaring holes in his story that should have comprised the greater chunk in his cathartic tale of woe.

 

Gaara clearly listened but his stoic face never betrayed a reaction. Typical.

 

‘I was alone as a child as well.’ Lupin hadn’t seen the sand sift through the air until it solidified into the sentence above Gaara. ‘My mother died in childbirth and I was a weapon and a curse to my father, nothing more.’ ‘Over the course of my life, there have been many attempts on my life, all from the people from my village.’ ‘I deserved them.’ The older man wanted to butt in here and ardently deny that damning self-assertion but the conviction on Gaara’s face wasn’t the angst ridden damage of low self-esteem but the dark chiselled regrets of a lifetime of mistake engraved onto a person’s soul. He’d seen a lot of faces like this but never on a child.

 

Gaara looked up at Lupin for a long moment, which the man mistakenly believed was an invitation for comfort or a pause in communication so as to not overwhelm himself and come to tears. Gaara was measuring the man before him, considering whether or not he was as trustworthy as Gaara wanted to believe his friends in this world were. They could betray him and cause him so much trouble and damage, but would they? They could profit from that, maybe even get Sirius off the hook by having him ‘out’ the monster from another world.

 

‘Where I’m from’, Gaara held up one last moment as he intently watched Lupin’s face as it peered upwards at the words, and waited to see some sort of anticipation, a look of ambition or relief, but all he got was that confusing patience. ‘-is another world.’ His first ever friend _had_ told him he needed to trust in people to create real bonds. Perhaps he could get some help.

 

“Wait, what? What do you mean by ‘another world’, Gaara?” Lupin had done a double take after seeing those words. Things flashed through the man’s head, maybe a different culture far removed from his own, or maybe the muggle world? But he kept coming back to just how strange Gaara was and how Sirius had described his first appearance, as falling from a great height but from no obvious means, covered in the most horrible cuts and slashes and very disorientated.

 

Gaara went on to tell Lupin just a little about his home world, about Sunagakure, the Five Great Shinobi Nations and the common existence of shinobi and some of their roles. He spared Lupin some of the more exact details and tried to downplay the murdering side of shinobi life a little, but for the most part he painted a pretty vivid picture of life in the Elemental Nations.

 

It was Gaara’s underestimation of the effect that telling his own biographical experience of his home world would have on his friend that led to him tilting his head when Lupin began to tear up, as if Gaara had just told him some tragic story. He’d totally left out the later years of his life including the war-time preparations, his father’s death and the demon that resided within him; but then he’d also skipped over his redemption and finding some measure of happiness that had been almost entirely absent from his beginnings.

 

“All this time, Gaara, I’ve suspected that you were different, but now it all makes so much sense. You’ve been stuck here alone all this time with nobody to talk to about it, I’m sorry I didn’t see the truth earlier.” Lupin put his hand on Gaara’s shoulder, further confusing the borderline-sociopath further still, “From now on, I will do anything I can to help you, and I know for certain that Sirius would do the same.”

 

Lupin continued to look the at the off-worlder with a smile, as if Gaara somehow now made total sense to him, and then frowned in consideration, “Gaara, I need to ask this, but do you want to return to where you came from? I would do whatever I could to help you stay here and once Sirius is cleared he would be more than happy to support you.” The thought of sending Gaara back to a world where a child could be considered a warrior and that had produced a child, no matter how sweet, as damaged as Gaara, was repugnant to the emotional Marauder. A small part of him really hoped that Gaara would want to stay, in the short time he’d know Gaara it had been like back in his school days again for the first time in over a decade, with Sirius back in his life too and being back in Hogwarts.

 

‘It is my home and I have precious people waiting for me there that I have to protect.’ ‘I can’t let them down. I need to return.’

 

Lupin tried not to look too disappointed, “Then I will do whatever I can to help you, Lily.” ... “Ehehe... And do you want Sirius to know about this or would you rather this stay between us for now?”

 

Gaara stopped glaring long enough to write out ‘Tell him.’ The Suna citizen couldn’t imagine that Sirius would act any worse than Remus had, especially when considering Sirius’ own history of betrayal. It was something of a weight off of his chest now that someone in this world knew that he wasn’t a native inhabitant.

 

Seeing as Gaara had gone quiet again (figuratively speaking) Lupin said “It’s going to be alright, Gaara.” And he leaned forward and hugged the small thirteen year-old, forgetting he was dealing with Gaara and not any other thirteen year-old that had been put through such trauma. Gaara stayed perfectly still and as stiff as board under the firm and kind hold before Lupin released him with a tearful smile on his face, as if to say ‘We’ve been through a lot together this evening but we’ll be okay.’

 

Gaara’s frown said ‘Sand auto-defence reactivating in 3...2...’

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Later that same night, after Gaara had had all of the emotional out-pouring he could take, he had left Lupin to do whatever it is that teachers do at night when they’re finally up-to-date on all of their work, lesson plans and marking.

 

This night, Lupin decided that in spite of the worsening lycanthropy pains he needed to speak to Sirius in person, a task that had been made more difficult by the increase in the dementor presence around the castle at night.

 

This was one of the many reasons that the werewolf was suspicious of just how much Dumbledore was aware of, as the headmaster clearly knew about the hidden passageway under the Whomping Willow and yet he hadn’t requested that any dementors be posted outside the entrance to it. It wasn’t as if he actually used that passageway during his monthly issues anymore. The Wolfsbane Potion was the best thing to happen to him in his twenties by far. The Forbidden Forrest was a very beautiful place when you were one of the scariest things in there. Though he didn’t even want to know what that overwhelmingly doggish scent all of over the place was. It was like a gigantic Padfoot had decided to mark half the trees in the woods.

 

He found Sirius snoozing away in his dog form at the top of the rickety stairs, but with the seriousness to come, he had to forgo the traditional attempt to prank the sleeping marauder and just walk noisily up the stairs to wake up the shaggy dog. Sirius was startled at the intrusion but settled back down to an excited wagging when he saw who had come to visit. Lupin walked past the excitable dog-man and into the most comfortable remaining bedroom before falling into the softest patch of the weather-worn bed. The full-moon was always worst during the winter months and the build up was no different.

 

Sirius trotted in with his tongue hanging out, probably expecting something substantial to eat, which Lupin had forgotten to pick up before coming. It wasn’t exactly a regular visit here, he needed to talk, not watch Sirius or Padfoot with his face shoved in some food and his ass in the air. Lupin had often wondered how James had managed to keep himself so human when both Sirius and Peter had become so animalistic even after they had transformed back. Probably something to do with the inherent dignity a stag walks around with compared to a mutt and a rat. That or self-control. Sirius had always acted like an animal anyway, once some of that patented Black conditioning had been stripped away.

 

After an awkward few moments it was clear that the dog would not be getting anything for dinner so he transformed back into his human form and began to shiver until he wrapped himself in one of the ragged blankets from the bed. The air was getting colder and turning into a fur-less human was becoming harder and harder. The cold air was something that Lupin, of all people, could sympathise with, considering all of the mornings he’d woken up in the middle of nowhere on a crisp winter’s mornings to then have to search for his clothes. Cold weather was bad, cold weather naked was worse, cold weather naked with the accumulated aches and pains that surrounded the full-moon was an entirely different matter. Luckily he had found a good method of finding his way back to his clothes before the morning broke as, like with most things, the aches and chills apparently got worse with age.

 

“No food, Moony?” Talk about puppy-dog eyes; Sirius was a puppy that had never grown up.

 

“I’m sorry but it was already late and I didn’t have time to stop by the kitchens on my way here. There’s something you need to hear, it’s about Gaara.” Sirius was pouting, for God’s sake! “I’ll come back tomorrow with something for you to eat.” As Remus said it, he couldn’t stop the sigh that escaped with his breath. He hoped that Sirius wouldn’t pick up on it. He didn’t want Sirius to think that Remus considered his best friend a burden. After abandoning Sirius for over a decade, the least he could do was help him now.

 

“Oh God, Moony, the full moon, I didn’t think. It should be sometime soon, right?”

 

“It’s in a couple of days, but I’ll manage. And I didn’t come here to discuss my monthly cycle.”

 

“You said it’s about Gaara, he’s okay, right?” Sirius snapped back to his seldom seen serious side as his normally carefree nature was swept aside by this newest of feelings, adult concern. A child at heart, Sirius wasn’t used to having someone younger and more vulnerable (in his eyes) in his life and he hadn’t expected to feel it until maybe the day that Harry moved in with him, after he’d adopted him.

 

“Yes, he’s fine, although that depends on who you ask, I suppose.” Lupin sighed again, exasperated this time at the level of drama the red-head ran into on a regular basis. From what he’d heard about Harry’s previous two years, Gaara might give the Pronglset a run for his money on the peril and excitement score. “I’ll start at the beginning. Thanks to that insane Minister for Magic, we were forced to play hosts to the head of his Administrative Inspectors...”

 

Lupin went on to describe the inspection, Dumbledore’s equal insanity with his plan to move Gaara around, and then the fight between Gaara and Harry, which was something of a sore subject for the both of them, conflicts of interest and all. The flying carpet prank, from a Malfoy of all people, and then Gaara’s fight with Snape. To say that Sirius was happy to hear that Gaara had not only got into a scrap with the snake-bat but had come out of it mostly unscathed, would be the grossest of understatements. From there he related Gaara’s faux-punishment that led to that night’s conversation.

 

The look on Sirius’ face, when Remus revealed what Gaara had told him, would have been the ideal defence against any dementor as it was identical to the expression worn by convicts who’d just received the dementor’s kiss. That blank soullessness didn’t last long enough for a getaway though as immediately Sirius sprang back with a myriad of questions that Remus didn’t have any answers to.

 

It was testament to Sirius’ implicit trust in the boy he’d saved that he didn’t doubt what he’d been told for a second and was instead more concerned with 1) whether Gaara wanted to go back and 2) how Sirius could help.

 

Remus had spent a fair amount of time with Gaara over the past few months, but Sirius’ bond with the child was something that had been forged out of mutual hardship rather than from time in proximity.

 

They talked long into the night about Gaara being from another world, his difficult life and his status as a warrior ‘shinobi’. Talk eventually moved onto the future, with Sirius’ plans to find Pettigrew, to reunite with Harry, and also to help Gaara in any way he could.

 

Sitting by the window, Sirius looked up to the bright almost full moon and smiled. “You know, Remus, before I saw Gaara falling from the sky, I was sure I knew what I was going to do. I was going to see Harry, and then I was going to rip Peter to shreds, consequences be damned. All those years alone in Azkaban, and then hiding out in squalor, all I could think of was revenge. I hated it. You know what the worst part about it was?”

 

Remus shook his head.

 

“How selfish I felt. I was so angry, for what they did to James and Lily, to Harry’s future, to everyone else as well, but in Azkaban, I could only think about how much I had suffered because I had lost my friends and my own future. It didn’t change after I escaped from there, I just saw that article with that _rat_ in it and I was obsessed with getting here and killing him. I wanted to protect Harry from Peter also, but that wasn’t anything more than something to help me sleep at night.”

 

“Sirius, you don’t have to-”

 

“They say that dementors suck out happiness, and have to kiss you to take your soul, but I swear I must have lost something in there, my mind or something else, because I couldn’t think straight. It was my fault that James and Lily died, I told them to switch, and then I ignored Harry so that I could satisfy my own anger!”

 

“You know that wasn’t your fault, you smelly idiot! Peter lied to all of us, the traitor could have as easily been me; how could you know? You did what you did, what you could, to protect them.” Remus hated it when Sirius got so maudlin; it was so out of character. He could deal with funny Sirius, angry Sirius, pranking Sirius, but not quiet sad Sirius.

 

“I was doing it all again, Remus, and then Gaara arrived and I had someone to take care of, something to distract me from myself. For the first time in twelve years I had to think about someone else. I owe Gaara so much.”

 

“If you feel that way, maybe next time _you_ can practice duelling with him.”

 

Remus left a lot later than he would have liked, with the sure knowledge that by the next morning he would be willing to take Professor Binns as a substitute teacher for his early vlasses in order to rest. He was glad, however, that Sirius had been able to get some of this stuff off of his chest before it continued to fester. At least Sirius had stopped talking about storming the castle and dragging Peter out himself. He hoped that meant Padfoot had stopped thinking about it.

 

Sirius seemed more preoccupied with Gaara’s fight with Severus than the fact that he had been transported there from another world. He kept asking for details and wanted to hear that Severus had been badly injured. The escapee had looked a little sullen when Lupin said that their old school punching bag hadn’t even walked away with a limp, though with a stoic man like Snape, you never could tell what he was hiding.

 

The next morning, those in the know wondered whether Lupin was in fact a vampire rather than a werewolf, seeing as he wore sunglasses to breakfast, looked deathly pale and hissed when he inadvertently walked into direct sunlight.

 

That morning also saw a fresh blanket of snow on the vast Scottish lands around the castle, which caused Draco another drama in the form of an unusually childish and obstinate Gaara, who refused to get out of bed on the grounds that the castle was too cold and not freezing to death was a higher priority than learning.

 

Any attempt to physically remove the insane (but recovering) teenager from his bed was dangerous and futile, which Draco had figured when he had approached. Even Dumbledore would have been hard pressed to remove the demon-jailer from his warm snugly bed without relying on the Elder Wand that morning.

 

Draco only got Gaara to leave his bed, that was littered with books that that incredibly useful sand had fetched for him in preparation of a full day inside his fortress of comfort, when Draco warned Gaara that he would liable for a _real_ detention if he didn’t turn up to class. He then went on to describe one of his own more harrowing detentions when he and Potter had had to patrol the Dark Forest in his first year at night. That hadn’t seemed to affect the regular forest pedestrian, which made sense since Draco couldn’t imagine there was anything that much scarier than Gaara in there, that is until Draco elaborated that that would mean that Gaara would have to walk around outside when the air was at its coldest.

 

Pretty soon Gaara was in the shower and into many layers of school uniform. He kept putting on clothes until he couldn’t fit anymore on or ran out. Madame Pomfrey, who was eating her hearty and balanced breakfast in the Great Hall, thought that Gaara looked much more healthy that morning, barring the prominent scowl that looked angry compared to his trademark contempt-filled scowl. It looked as if he wasn’t as painfully skinny as he’d always been, but then he was wearing most of the clothes he had in the world.

 

Gaara was angry because not only had he been dragged out into this world’s version of Snow country, but he would later have to go and check on Fluffy out in the woods, seeing as he had somehow taken the beast on as his responsibility. The surest sign of recovery from total psychopathy was empathy towards animals, wasn’t it? Since Shukaku was screaming, as he had always, for him to either leave the animal to die in the cold, whimpering in agony and misery, or to go out and kill the loyal pet and enjoy the look of betrayal on its faces. As a rule, these days, Gaara tried to do the opposite of what his sand demon told him to do, so he cut a compromise of going out there to check it was alright and not killing it.

 

Still, no matter the benevolent reasons, Gaara was angry that he was still going to have to trek out into the ice and snow and then endure whatever torturous ‘play’ Fluffy wished to put him through before he could schlep back to the castle to warm up. If he went all the way out there to find that the dog had died anyway, he would have been very upset. Wasting his time and warmth...

 

As the clothing-cocoon, once known as Sabaku no Gaara, sat eating a warm bowl of full-fat milk porridge, he watched Draco talking animatedly with his other new friends after Gaara had refused any interaction whilst he was still this cold. Desert dwellers had no place living in sub-zero conditions, no matter how much they tried to warm up the castle. And established irritable desert-dwellers in foul moods due to adverse weather conditions were not the greatest conversationalists and the dirty look Gaara shot Draco when he had tried to talk to him earlier had persuaded the blond to leave his roommate alone for the day and continue his bridge building among his fellow bottom-rung peers. Although, the other elites/blood-purists in his year were not entirely opposed to letting him associate with them from time to time, that was only when they weren’t too exposed to the other year-groups that might see them with a suspected blood traitor.

 

Draco, whilst technically now a blood traitor at heart, would have to find some way of discreetly squashing that suspicion. It was insulting to be in the same league as that moron Weasley and the half-blood, blood traitor Potter. At least Gaara was no longer believed to be some sort of plebeian since he had fought both Potter, which earned him points on so many levels, and Snape which was more cool than respectable. Snape was still their Head of House and on Slytherin’s side, but Gaara had fought toe to toe with him so the Slytherin loyalists at least respected that he hadn’t stood for being insulted.

 

With his number-one crony in better standing, as long as no one questioned his beliefs on the true station of mud-bloods, Draco was almost one of the guys again, in his old circle, but the tension was still there with the underlying understanding that he didn’t believe exclusively in blood purity anymore. It was a simple case of don’t ask, don’t tell, and everybody’s relatively happy.

 

During the day, the teachers avoided calling on Gaara more than they usually would, which was rare enough with his muteness and acerbic nature. If there had been any doubt that Gaara had started a fight with a teacher before that morning, there certainly wasn’t by the time he had made his rounds in the castle for his lessons.

 

Apparently, or so Draco told his friends the next day, Gaara had decided to take his chances with punishment and had retreated to his bed sometime during his free period when everybody else was suffering in the dungeons doing Potions, after having gone outside for some reason. Professor Snape didn’t even seem to notice the terrifying number of sharp icicles above their heads on the ceiling.

 

The next day, Draco and Lupin were taught a clothes warming charm to bribe Gaara back into regular attendance. Lupin had been concerned when Gaara hadn’t shown up to his lesson that evening, but had instead had Draco go in his place with a note apologizing for falling ill suddenly and being unable to attend.

 

For someone who had never gone to any sort of formal schooling before, and who had solved most of his problems over the years through violence and murder, Gaara had adapted to school remarkably quickly, having just skived off of his first day of school and his first detention.

 

The note wasn’t very convincing and Draco outright told him that Gaara wasn’t ill at all and was in fact just sat reading, but it was such normal behaviour that Remus laughed and awarded Draco a few points for doing the good deed. He probably should take some from Gaara, but... well... maybe he would if he remembered to do it in the morning...

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

The next evening, after the lessons of the day had been braved in spite of the continuing and evidently worsening cold front, Gaara sat next to Draco and listened to him complain about some Quidditch news that he had apparently taken personal offence to.

 

Gaara had to actively hold back a little smile that was trying to stretch onto his lips when he glanced out of the corner of his eye that Ron Weasley, Draco’s polar opposite (according to Draco), was similarly exasperated as he complained about something very much along the same lines as the Slytherin next to him, at east judging by the identical gestures and hand movements.

 

Quidditch was the great unifier, it seemed. Not, Gaara was sure, that either of the enthusiasts would admit such a shared interest. Gaara was certain that, just to spite each other, they would probably swear that they hated the beloved sport.

 

In the middle of his increasingly energetic rant about a questionable call during a match (Gaara couldn’t give more details about his friend’s impassioned but ultimately boring speech than that), Draco glanced back over his shoulder to see if he was rudely bothering any of the others around him and while his head was turned he didn’t catch the lightning fast action of Gaara pouring a small vial of an unspecified liquid onto his dinner.

 

Not knowing that a mysterious substance had been poured onto his dinner, Draco didn’t think twice about tucking into the meal in between angry complaints to his disinterested friend.

 

It wasn’t much longer until Draco slowed in his speech and switched his grouching to being unusually tired and wanting to go to bed early. Being the considerate roommate that he was, Gaara went with the drowsy blond to the dormitory, mindful of the now setting sun casting an orange glow across the roof of the Great Hall.

 

By the time they reached the entrance to the Slytherin common room, Draco was nodding off whilst standing, and was slurring his speech. As luck would have it, he collapsed before they entered the boy’s dormitory and Gaara had to carry the slightly larger teen to the room, that is until the sun set somewhere above and out of sight. Gaara only knew the sun had set because like a month ago, that same sensation of change began to set about him and he was forced to set Draco back onto the ground and call his sand back into its gourd. The last thing Gaara needed was for the rest of Slytherin to return from dinner to find Draco sleeping, drugged, in a pile of Gaara sand and him nowhere to be found.

 

It was strange that now he was transforming awake into the tiny demon-tanuki form, it didn’t hurt at all like it had when he had experienced transforming back into a human. He _hoped_ it was just that his body was accustomed to the change; he _expected_ that it would probably still hurt when he went back to normal.

 

First he began to shrink, so he stumbled down the hallway and into his room to shift in privacy. Better that Draco and his own gourd be found on the floor of the hallway than him in the middle of transforming. By the time he’d slammed the door shut, he was already half his original size and his ass was beginning to tingle, which he interpreted to mean that he would soon be sporting a long bushy tail from it. Meanwhile, as the tail grew out of his spine, a warmth spread across his skin and his fur sprouted.

 

As the tail crept out of his spine, Gaara marvelled at the indescribable sensation, and he wondered how another Jinchūriki would handle this part, seeing as the one he knew would have had to endure nine long tails growing from his backside. Then again, knowing that nine-tailed-idiot, he probably would have laughed and celebrated the extra extremities. Gaara would not be celebrating, especially not when his feet began to lengthen in spite of his wishes to the contrary and he began to totter as his least favourite change took place. It was a bit of a tossup, but while he detested his shorter stature, the depths of his hatred for these backwards animal legs was unending.

 

The entire change, including fur, tail and beastly physique, took only twenty minutes so Gaara promptly shuffled out of his clothes, bundled them up in his arms and dumped them on his bed before creeping back to the door and laying his big sensitive ear on it to hear if anyone had stumbled across Draco yet. Hearing not a peep, only his roommate’s soft, uninterrupted breathing, Gaara reached up and tried to turn to the door knob. He growled when the soft paw couldn’t get a proper grip on it and he had to reach up with both hand-paws, on the tips of his toes, to grab at the slippery knob.

 

The amount of effort it took to perform the simplest tasks was infuriating. Usually Gaara’s menacing temper was displayed only through his glaring eyes, but in this form it seemed he unconsciously added a soft growl and his top lip drew back a little show off his pointy canines. He suspected his... hackles... he suspected the hair on the back of his neck was also on end, but he didn’t have time to check himself in a mirror, dinner in the Great Hall wouldn’t last for much longer and he had work to do.

 

He slipped out of the room and darted his eyes back and forth, imagining himself to be very much inside enemy territory where discovery would equate to a fate worse than death. So, usually, in his missions that meant torture, but his pride was important to him. One of those pesky Slytherin traits that made Gaara ponder whether that poor talking hat at the beginning of term had actually glimpsed inside his cluttered head.

 

Gaara didn’t doubt that Shukaku, and most demons in fact, would be Slytherins, but he himself? He very much doubted the Sorting Hat would be willing to try a second time, not to mention Gaara was about as happy in this house as he was likely to be in any.

 

That being said, the number of missing students that would have amounted from him being sorted into Gryffindor would have likely given cause for the collected governors to review the age-old system of sorting in Hogwarts. Ravenclaw might have worked....

 

Gaara stepped up to one of the better reasons he’d rather stay in Slytherin, and marvelled (begrudgingly) how much taller Draco was now, even slumped against the wall. It wasn’t fair that everyone was _always_ taller than him. It had always been a miracle that he didn’t kill that many children when he was still mad, but now he considered whether he’d spared them simply to remain taller than somebody.

 

Gaara’s mind kept wandering in a similar fashion as he struggled to take a firm hold of Draco so he could drag the blond into the seclusion of their room. ‘This job would have been so much easier ten minutes ago.’ Gaara kept repeating in his mind.

 

Eventually he pulled Draco’s torso up against his own tiny back and slowly dragged his roommate along. A particularly troublesome part was that he then had to keep pulling the larger boy even after they had reached safety, away from prying eyes, all so that Gaara could dump Draco on his bed.

 

Gaara _was_ inconsiderate.

 

Gaara was inconsiderate – but even Draco might have questioned Gaara’s willingness to let Draco not only collapse from a suspicious and sudden drowsiness but to then let Draco spend the night on the carpeted floor only feet away from their beds.

 

From now on, no one could possibly call Gaara selfish, as he lifted Draco’s limp body, which weighed probably at least twice his own, over his head and rolled him onto the mattress. Gaara slumped down to sit against Draco’s bed, with his giant fluffy tail nestled between his legs like a bean-bag and panted his exertion away. He’d retained thumbs (arguably) and yet he’d not retained his sweat glands. What cruel fate indeed.

 

Crueller still since he had to then drag his gourd into the room, which was _so_ much heavier! It took him a lot longer to do, but once he worked out that, like most things in this body, it was easier done on all four of his legs, it became possible to accomplish.

 

He lost his sweat glands, but his teeth were stronger than ever, and had no trouble pulling the sash attached to the considerable weight of tiny ground-up rocks he never had any trouble carrying before. Once the gourd was just inside the door frame, Gaara dropped it and shut the door, only padding over to his bed before collapsing onto it, which was tougher when he had to climb onto the bed using his well-protected tail as a footstool of sorts.

 

It was a tail of a thousand and one uses, it seemed, as Gaara sat back on his pillows and curled it around him to prop up the now comically-sized spell book he was attempting to read. It wasn’t the most exciting thing to do whilst transformed into an entirely different species, but Gaara wasn’t much of an adrenaline junkie, not like he used to be when he’d get his fix of adrenaline and other fear-induced hormones right out of his victims’ blood. His forehead protector hadn’t always been black but some stains just didn’t wash out, no matter how hard Temari scrubbed.

 

Temari didn’t clean up after her brothers because she was a girl, it was because Gaara was oblivious in some areas and Kankuro was a slob who pretended to be as unaware as Gaara. If she didn’t do it, who would?

 

But back to Gaara and his current pastime: he was really killing time as the students of Slytherin began to return to the dungeons to continue their nefarious plotting of evil schemes and discussing politics over tea, or at least that was what the other houses seemed to believe. Gaara would have loved to be able to hear an evil scheme; he’d been so disappointed to find that Slytherins, like most Houses, sat around chatting and doing homework most nights. There was the occasional muttering about cursing some sorry student or a parent’s evil deeds, but so far nothing worth staying to listen to. It wasn’t as if he wanted to take part, he just couldn’t understand why the house reputed to be so vile and subversive had to be so passive and quiet.

 

People passed by the door but not a single one stopped outside his. Most dorms in Hogwarts were host to social gatherings in the rooms of the students, no matter how many students were supposed to be staying in that room, even in Slytherin’s exclusive shared rooms. All except Gaara and Draco’s, a rooming situation that caused many of Draco’s new and old friends to scratch their heads at the feasibility of such an allocation and to politely but firmly refuse offer to join Draco in his room.

 

Speaking of Draco, who was still sleeping away in the same uncomfortable heap Gaara had left him in on his own bed. Gaara had resorted to drugging Draco because he realised he had to do something to avoid suspicion for never being around during the night of the full moon. So he had come to the obvious conclusion considering his brother’s profession, and had snuck in a certain Potions master’s private store cupboard and stole a finished brew. It hadn’t even crossed the inept potioneer’s mind to steal the less traceable ingredients and make it himself. If it had, Draco might never have woken up.

 

People outside the door settled down to their evening activities and increasingly Gaara’s mind wandered to anything but what he was reading. Eventually he closed the big hardback book, which took both hands, and jumped down from his bed.

 

He walked over to the full-length mirror that Gaara suspected Draco had brought to the room himself but couldn’t prove because he hadn’t been in any of his school mates’ rooms. It came as a crushing relief to see that, as he had suspected and hoped for the past month, nothing was different or _worse_ than it had been. He made the best of a bad situation and looked on the bright side. As long as he still transformed back at the end of the night, he would consider this lunar-cycle transformation nothing more than an embarrassing inconvenience.

 

It was all the same, the pointed fluffy ears, the long fat fluffy tail, the fluffy digitigrade-jointed legs. Everything fluffy and oh so adorable, as he was sure the female population of Hogwarts would agree, not that they would **_ever_** be given the chance.

 

Gaara was practically pulling out his own fur by the time the slow rhythm of drowsy adolescent footfalls marched outside his door signalling bedtime for all non-insomniacs in Slytherin. Gaara’s ears perked up as he waited for the stragglers, having some meaningless conversation, to walk to their own bedrooms. To be safe, Gaara waited a few minutes more, to be sure, but in the end his impatience won out and he carefully opened the door and snuck out with all of the stealth he could muster in this cumbersome form.

 

It was troubling yet exhilarating to be tiptoeing around in the areas that were normally so busy, when he was so vulnerable to others. The cool night draft that was certainly spelled into the subterranean common room was pleasant, as being cooped up in that stuffy bedroom all evening was almost unbearable.

 

Gaara, as he began to run around on twice as many limbs as he would have liked, came to the conclusion that this form must have introduced some kind of animalistic mentality into his normally stoic and balanced mind. It wasn’t as worrying as it should have been, all things considered, but then that was probably also because it was hard to concern himself over possible influences on his mind when he was just so glad to be out of that room and able to run around.

 

Maybe this was how some people felt all the time, bursting with energy and inexplicable impulses. If Gaara felt this way as a human, he might find himself in an orange jumpsuit one of these days, drooling over some pink-haired gorilla. Sakura was nice and all, and Gaara had nothing against her, but recently her punches had started to leave dents in his sand shield when he misspoke to her. Like a shorter, more effeminate Temari. Shudders all around.

 

Gaara didn’t wait too long in the common room; just because he was revelling in the wild side of daring-do didn’t mean that he wasn’t cautious enough to wish to avoid an area so prone to students sneaking around. Often the upper years would sneak out of bed and hold private parties in the common room, safe in the knowledge that the younger years were afraid of them and that Snape wouldn’t care nearly enough about his own snakes misbehaving to get out of bed past midnight.

 

Gaara thanked his lucky stars that unlike the Gryffindor common room that he’d heard about, Slytherin didn’t have a living portrait guarding the entrance. No one would be able to report that such a ‘strange little creature’ had emerged from Slytherin and had returned there before dawn. There also wouldn’t be anyone to remedy his leaving the door ajar so that he could return. He couldn’t talk as it was, which had made gaining access difficult but not impossible at most times; if he had been locked out in this form, he would have been forced to wait until sunrise, whereupon he would be totally naked, in order for one of his housemates to open up and let him in.

 

Now that he was free to roam the castle, Gaara let the last of his misgivings slip and gave into the enjoyment of running unrestrained through the empty stone corridors of Hogwarts at top speed, not paying attention to any direction, simply moving with the demand ‘forward.’

 

Gaara ascended stairs when he came to them, and ignored the questioning shouts of the portraits he’d woken up and who could only see a peculiarly long blur in the darkness that was moving far too quickly to be Mrs Norris. Absent minded as fuzzy-Gaara was, he didn’t realise he’d run past a person who had been minding their own business in the hallway.

 

Luna Lovegood, one time acquaintance of Gaara and all-time biggest nut job in Ravenclaw, had been retrieving her ‘lost’ school things earlier that evening and had come across her favourite ghost in the castle, the Grey Lady, whom she’d talked to for a few hours. And then she’d discovered that a few of the portraits on the sixth floor had been fighting and had taken it upon herself to mediate the dispute and then to move the problem painting to another area of the floor. All in a night’s work, and all that.

 

Luna had been on her way to returning to her tower, not quite sure which direction her home of two years was in, when her stride had been interrupted by a small sand coloured thing that had run past her, through the moonlit hall and out of sight.

 

“How strange.” She muttered softly, gazing after the curiosity for a few moments.

 

Her interest, inevitable that it was, compelled her to run after it. It wasn’t a ghost or a cat, but other than that she couldn’t say what it was. It didn’t look like any of the other things no one else saw but her, but she couldn’t see anything more specific in that one brief glance.

 

Luna geared up to a sprint as the creature, oblivious of her pursuit, ran much faster than she could, and she struggled to keep it in sight. As she ran, she saw that it had a great big tail, as long as she was tall, and it bobbed about in the wind as it darted about on its spring loaded little legs. It had some black stripes all over its body, or perhaps they were blue. The lighting wasn’t good and it seemed intent on running away from her, even if it gave no other outward sign that it was aware of her presence.

 

Her attempts to follow the fascinating little animal came to a full stop when the staircase it had just fled up changed and any chance of her catching up became nil. It was disappointing, but Luna decided she definitely wanted to discover what it was, so she’d have to drop her other side project of proving that there was an underclass of House Elves within institutions like Hogwarts depending on the droopiness of their ears.

 

Gaara honestly hadn’t been aware of any of this, but had Luna gotten a little closer perhaps his overly sensitized ears might have picked up his pursuer. Nonetheless, Gaara was content to continue to exercise flat out until he couldn’t take anymore. He hadn’t had a good workout in weeks and tonight that urge seemed paramount, superseded only by Gaara’s remaining conscious pride.

 

During his continued roaming that took him to all corners of the castle, barring the sealed off dorms, Gaara went to every floor of the school and to some areas he hadn’t known existed, like the laundry room and the locked door that led to the house elf room. It was a surprisingly ornate door for such humble beings.

 

On his lightning fast travels, he stopped every now and then to inspect something a little closer from his new perspective, and at one of these breathers he was tackled from the side by an even smaller fluffy lump. Throwing it off, Gaara saw the hissing, spitting form of Filch’s cat, Mrs Norris.

 

The disagreeable feline had never quite warmed up to him like all the other animals in this world seemed inclined to, but Gaara hadn’t expected such a reaction as this. The cat seemed hell-bent on causing him harm, as she stalked around him, trying to get at his back so that she could claw him to death. He was tempted to return the favour, since his claws were longer and even sharper. In the end, the pragmatist and tactician in him struggled to the surface and he allowed Mrs Norris to circle around to his back, and looked over his shoulder in order to time it perfectly.

 

She pounced and his tail sailed through the air to club her in the squashed face. The cat was sent flying into the wall and didn’t move more than a twitch after that.

 

He was twice her size and his tail was a formidable weapon, but nonetheless his ego was stroked just a bit by overcoming a foe in this debilitating form.

 

She’d wake up in a few hours with a headache and a newfound vendetta against the red-haired student who she was convinced had somehow transformed into this identically smelling but otherwise totally dissimilar being. Filch also earned himself an enemy that night, in the form of Madam Pomfrey, whom he had woken up in a frenzy, screaming about his dying precious Mrs Norris. “Perfectly fine, just knocked out and I am not a veterinary-witch, Argus!” Was the irate diagnosis. The next morning, a rumour circulated that there had been a torrid affair between the two staff members that had ended unfavourably leading to the dirty looks she kept sending him over her breakfast.

 

Still being very early in the morning, Gaara left the defeated body of Mrs Norris to continue his run anywhere and everywhere. It was a night of many adventures for Gaara, coming across Sir Nicholas de Mimsy-Porpington somewhere on the top floor of the main school building. The supernatural encounter was short but sweet; Jinchūriki, as a rule, don’t like ghosts at the best of times, much less when they can be as chatty as Nearly Headless Nick. The genteel spirit seemed as puzzled as everybody else in this world that met him in a form they couldn’t identify, but Sir Nicholas seemed to be spurred only into recounting one of his many adventures during which he had discovered a new type of pixie but then lost it and forgot what it looked like.

 

Bewildered and off put, Gaara walked away from the rambling ghost and walked onwards, unheeded. The view out of the windows, the ones that were low enough for Gaara to see out of, was stunning. The night sky seemed surprisingly clear and the moon shine illuminated the entire forbidden forest into shades of black and grey. Gaara would definitely prefer to spend the full moon in the open air next month, instead of darting about, practically jumping off the walls inside and surrounded by disturbances and threats.

 

As the sand coloured boy-tanuki continued his more subdued walk on the top floor, he passed a door he’d been told about but had never actually seen. If Draco was right, which Gaara calculated to be about an even chance, this was the door to the infamous Abandoned Tower of Hogwarts. So-called for plain reasons, the tower had not been set foot in for almost a century by any witch or wizard.

 

The story told of a pair of seventh-year students at the end of the nineteenth-century who had been practicing some experimental rune configurations in the tower one night, in an attempt to tap into the magic in the castle. Messing with the magic had caused an instability and the tower had to be condemned since no one at the time had the expertise or power to correct the problem. The students were never publically named, but several theories had surfaced over the years, because of the power and skill that would have been required to mess up so spectacularly.

 

It was said that after the initial evacuation by the precocious pair of students, any attempts to step into the tower’s entranceway caused the stones to rattle and shake. The hazardous area of the children’s learning institution would have been taken down decades ago were it not for the gaping hole that would have been left in the side of Hogwarts. Repairs could be made to Hogwarts these days, through the Department of Mysteries, but a mix of budget constraints and forgetting about the unusable tower among other reasons had led to it being left as it was by the school’s administration. Headmaster Dumbledore had always seemed oddly evasive about the matter, the few times the governors had broached the subject.

 

Gaara opened the door, wondering why in the world such a dangerous area of the school wasn’t locked and/or sealed with heavy magic wards, and poked his head beyond. The darkened staircase was filthy and looked so far aged compared to the rather pristine looking castle. Still buzzing from his adrenaline rush, Gaara didn’t think twice about setting foot inside of the unstable entrance. He figured that humans were too heavy, whereas he was not. Gaara: 1, full-sized people: 0.

 

Later Gaara, when he was back to skin and properly shaped legs, would begin to worry just how present the animal instinct was in his mind, that he would be so reckless and careless. Next month, he decided, in the morning, he would most certainly go into the Dark Forest, filled with all kinds of deadly and evil monsters, where it was safe for a small defenceless tanuki-thing like him.

 

Now, however, Gaara wasn’t thinking as straight as his mind might have led him to believe, so he didn’t see a real problem with passing into the stairway and climbing it slowly and somewhat cautiously. To tanuki-Gaara’s credit he didn’t disturb any of the stones of the castle, even if he could tell that they only just allowed his weight upon them.

 

At the top of the stairs was a single chamber, but a surprisingly roomy one, almost the size of the Divinations space. It was sparse and featured a number of what Gaara understood to be antique furniture, in varying states of decay. There was a hole in the roof and a few bats were hanging from the ceiling, looking well fed.

 

The stone tower was nothing more than a condemned stone wreck that was still standing by the grace of God alone, and as he shuffled around some of the more perilous looking areas of the flooring, Gaara believed the only use for such a tower would be to grind it up as sand for one of his techniques. As slack as the security in Hogwarts seemed most of the time, the sand user couldn’t imagine that they wouldn’t miss an entire tower disappearing.

 

Through the hole in the ceiling, Gaara saw the most minor change in the colour of the night sky and turned around to go back to the dorms ready for the dawn reversion. He didn’t dilly-dally on the return journey, since dawn in the autumn came so much later and he didn’t want the early risers, up before the sun, to see him.

 

He got back to safety as he heard the students in the other rooms begin to wake, and climbed back into his own bed, after he’d thrown some pyjamas under the sheets. Even underground he could sense the ongoing setting of the moon, so Gaara cocooned himself in his bed sheets and waited, hoping the sleeping potion he had dosed Draco with would hold out a few minutes more. Wrapping himself up served to hide him if Draco did wake up early, and it would also protect the delicate boy from the dastardly cold that was soon to come. Fur kept him warm, skin did not.

 

If he was to survive the winter in this country, Gaara was going to have to find a way to insulate his sand armour technique, or else make himself a fur coat out of something in the Forbidden Forrest.

 

It was just as people began to exit their rooms and walk to the Great Hall that Gaara felt the beginnings of the shift, and it was just as painful as the last time he’d changed back. It appeared that morphing into his inconvenient monthly form was painless but turning back to normal was anything but.

 

Gaara stifled his growls that turned into throaty groans that then became muted. He gripped the sheets around him as the hairs crawled back under his skin and his tail forced its way into his back once more. His legs snapped and stretched and within ten minutes, Gaara was human once more, and he was glad of it, even if he was left shivering from the pain more than the chill that assaulted his senses directly after.

 

It was as he pulled on his bed clothes that he began to reflect on his flippant decision making the night before and questioned his working logic behind the bizarre flippancy.

 

By some uncommon stroke of luck, it was soon after this that Draco began to stir, adding his own share of groans to the morning as his neck cricking woke him up with a wince. As drowsy and pained as Draco was, he didn’t argue when Gaara told him that he’d looked very tired the night before and had crashed as soon as his head hit the pillow without even changing. Draco didn’t argue because he was tired and because he was struggling enough with reading the sand before his eyes, much less finding holes in the blurry story.

 

Draco did however notice that Gaara coughed more than once and seemed to be holding his throat like it was paining him. Draco asked, “Are you okay Gaara? You aren’t sick are you? Because Madam Pomfrey would probably give you something for your throat, if you asked. Or is it your, you know, scar...?”

 

The reverence or caution with which Draco spoke of Gaara’s destroyed voice box and slashed throat would have put many in mind of the manner in which people referred to Harry Potter’s famous scar, but since the one who spoke had never given any kind of respect to Potter and his scar and Gaara had not been there to hear the initial interest in the Boy-Who-Lived in the first year, the resemblance was missed entirely.

 

Gaara did seem to have a frog in his throat, but it wasn’t anything worth seeing the overbearing matron about. Her spells couldn’t heal him anyway and his throat wasn’t that much worse than last month, so he didn’t give Draco an answer and simply stepped of the bed and went to change for the day.

 

When he returned, Draco was still stretching and trying to undo the night’s sleeping badly and Gaara felt a little guilty about the whole thing so he tapped Draco on the shoulder before he could go to change as well and pointed at his floating sand.

 

‘You’re tired. You can rest this Saturday instead of training.’ Instead of relieved, Draco was terrified. He hadn’t considered that now that they were friends again he would be expected to join Gaara in exercising outside like a _muggle_ again. He’d hoped that was forgotten, or at least that Gaara would have been put off by the frigid weather at the moment that was only set to worsen in the Scottish highland.

 

Draco’s terror at being forced to exhaust himself for no reason subsided because he remembered it was the first Hogsmeade trip this weekend for his year group and he’d be able to go and treat himself to a nice butterbeer and all kinds of confections.

 

As Draco chatted (to himself, mostly) about the trip, Gaara didn’t get as excited as Draco had anticipated. Gaara never reacted that much anyway, but the Hogsmeade trip was an outing, a special day and yet Gaara simply looked bored as he covertly swept up the few stray strands of fur that had been left last night. Anywhere else such evidence was negligible, but there had been no animals in their room to blame the sand coloured hairs on and could have led to some inconvenient questions.

 

Over breakfast, they talked quietly, or in Gaara’s case his sand writing was brought down so that it was not so visible to others; they each recounted some of what had happened to them when they’d been fighting. They talked of Quidditch practices that had gone awry, of the progress of ‘secret’ supplementary lessons, and the day the weird guy from the Ministry came looking for Gaara. Draco even mentioned, briefly as he could manage, his correspondence with his parents, leaving out the offer of Christmas at the Malfoy home until another day. In turn, Gaara talked about the ‘fight’ he’d had with Potter and how it had all been a misunderstanding, which was doubly so for Gaara since he didn’t understand how such a whimsical match could be called a fight.

 

Reformed or not, Draco was a little tickled by the prospect of Harry being beaten up. He’d been there, but reliving it was just so much fun. He might fundamentally agree with Potter and his back-up dancers on a few issues now, and most of his antagonism stemmed from where they used to differ in those areas, but enough had happened between them now that Draco honestly didn’t care about the ideals or politics, he just didn’t like Harry Potter. In many ways it was actually nicer to hate someone because of petulance and grudges instead of political agendas that were never his to begin with. A nice simple feud.

 

Draco watched Gaara eat his meagre portion and piped up, “You didn’t sleep last night.”

 

A statement, unknowably true; Gaara turned to Draco and waited for him to elaborate. The platinum blond obviously hadn’t been awake to see Gaara not sleep, otherwise he certainly wouldn’t have begun by mentioning Gaara’s casual approach to sleep schedules and instead would definitely have whispered in panicked tones about transformations and the like.

 

Draco did eventually continue unprompted to explain his insight about the guarded shinobi, “I don’t know if anyone’s ever told you this before, but when you don’t sleep your eyes are really wide all day long.”

 

Indeed, no one had told him that before. Although sleep was a relatively new concept for him, he hadn’t ever been in the habit of spending enormous amounts of time preening in front of the mirror, unlike some people he knew (Kankuro didn’t like it being advertised that he drew on his makeup fresh every morning), so Gaara had never noticed how his eyes had relaxed ever since his mastery of Shukaku reached safe levels and how they would revert to his ‘crazy look’ when he reverted to his insomniac ways.

 

It just went to show that Draco’s immaculate visage was the profit of hard work and not as God-given as he might have liked others to believe. Only someone obsessed with image would have noticed such a variation even in someone they lived in such close quarters to.

 

Gaara just couldn’t understand that someone could take such a humanitarian interest in his welfare outside of his own oblivious family. He allowed his eyes to drift up to the staff table, seeking out Lupin but failed to find the sickly man. It was no surprise that Remus, as ill as he had been the past few days, had taken the morning off.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

It came time for the third years and above to make their first trip of the year to the nearby village of Hogsmeade and Draco couldn’t be more excited. He thought Gaara _could_ be more excited, but he settled on the masked bandit just going. He even charmed Gaara’s cloak(s) to stay nice and toasty all day long so that he wouldn’t have a good reason to complain. As it happened, Gaara was willing to go anyway, not being concerned about going since he had no money and no need to get anything in Hogsmeade, but since it was too cold to train anywhere or to relax in any way he figured if he kept moving he might stave off frostbite. The heated cloak, God’s gift to wizardry, sweetened the deal considerably.

 

As Draco and Gaara stepped out of the massive back doors into the snow covered courtyard, Gaara thought that it was times like these and only times like these that he wished that he was a Gryffindor. He heard they had a really warm common room. It was inconceivable that there were so many eager lions raring to go hike through the snow to the ice covered village that he’d been found in by Snape a couple of months ago.

 

Gaara spotted that those closest to the bridge were setting off and began onwards as well, heedless of whatever Gaara was telling him, only for Professor McGonagall to step into his path.

 

“Mr Gaara, I’m afraid students aren’t allowed to visit Hogsmeade without a signed permission form.”

 

Gaara paused for a moment, wondering what the problem was, and his sand popped out and asked what she was talking about for him.

 

Minerva wasn’t used to questions like this, and was unsure whether Gaara was being rude or whether he had genuinely never encountered a permission slip before, wherever he came from.

 

“The school needs the signature and thus permission of a responsible adult or guardian before it can release a student on a trip like this. Without a signed form, I’m afraid you’ll have to stay behind, Gaara.”

 

Gaara eyes widened and he relaxed as he thought he understood the strange concept. ‘If you give me a form, I will sign it now.’ He felt pretty satisfied that his assurance had solved whatever problem the teacher had. It was just a liability form like the one he’d signed for the Chunin exam. Though, remembering back to it, it would probably not be as dangerous as the Chunin exam was (for other people), but then the last time he’d been in Hogsmeade he’d been surrounded by dozens of dementors, so who knew?

 

“Mr Gaara, I don’t care for your sense of humour. Now, please step back inside.” McGonagall was in no mood for jokes as it seemed desert-dwellers and the elderly had in common a susceptibility to the cold despite any number of warming charms they utilised.

 

‘I don’t understand. I am an adult, why can I not sign the form?’ Gaara didn’t really care about the trip; this, like most of his problems in this age-obsessed world, was about his pride.

 

“Whilst this is hardly the time or the place to be arguing about the age of maturity, you are only thirteen years old and hardly in a place to take responsibility for your own safety.” Minerva slumped down a little, not wanting to patronise the short boy any further but wanting to look him in the eyes, “I am sorry Gaara. I understand that you have a unique family situation and no one is claiming that you are immature, but you are not an adult and cannot be given special treatment. Mr Potter over there also is unable to attend, you aren’t being singled out.” She looked around to where she had just seen Harry but he’d long gone off to brood somewhere.

 

Gaara was still confused, but figured that this was just one of those many many things that he didn’t understand about this world’s culture. He’d been an adult since he became a shinobi in his world, and he hadn’t been a child since he got his tattoo years ago (or when he’d lost his teddy some time after). Nonetheless, it really wasn’t the time to be arguing with teachers in such a slow manner as his, not in this weather, so he let the issue go and tried to figure out what to do with his day when all he wanted to do was find a spell that allowed humans to hibernate. Or perhaps find a school that was closer to the equator.

 

Draco was sad that Gaara had been barred from going on, but he decided to go on without him as going to Hogsmeade for the first time was a rite of passage for Hogwarts students, and he wanted his sweets. He’d make it up to Gaara by buying him plenty of candy as well. That’d cheer him up.

 

Draco spent the day splitting his time between the moderates, who acted like normal teenagers on a field trip, and the elitist blood purists (his old friends), who were willing to travel with him because of his continuing dubious status and undeniable wealth. His father had been pleased with his actions lately, minus the communications blackout, so his allowance had gotten a healthy bonus as a reward and he thought it was only fair that Gaara share in this windfall. He had planned to take Gaara around the shops to see if he wanted anything, but now he’d just go with something sweet. Who didn’t like sweets?

 

During the day while Harry was seeking out Professor Lupin to find out about his parents who the sickly DADA teacher apparently knew, Gaara found the perfect way to spend his Saturday: he snuck into the Gryffindor common room. He had planned to threaten the portrait of the Fat Lady to let him in when he found the painting ajar and unguarded after Neville had forgotten to close it properly on his way to the library just a few moments before.

 

Gaara sat himself down in front of the fire, wrapped up fully in a thick red blanket he’d found on the plush arm chair, and started on a new book. The few Gryffindors in the tower that had not gone on the trip, mostly first and second years, saw the blankets and book and assumed he was one of them, trying to stay warm.

 

During the day, Gaara was feeling very peaceful and cosy and when it quietened down in the dorm, he got up and had a proper look around. If someone found him in there he’d tell them he got lost, and then he’d sit back down and dare them to try and make him leave.

 

When the stairs refused to let him up, he decided that either the tower itself didn’t like him (a distinct possibility) or it was the girls’ dormitory he was trying to enter and the Gryffindors were so uncivilised that measures had had to be taken to stop the boys from doing something reprehensible in the night.

 

Up the other set of stairs, Gaara found the coops that housed so many boys in one room, on bunk beds of all things. Not everyone was as antisocial as his House, or indeed him, but it was still bizarre to think that the House of red and gold had to live in such close quarters. It couldn’t be to do with funds so it must have been to do with the ideals of the house. Gaara shuddered to think after the sleeping arrangements of Hufflepuff, the friendship house. He soon saw everything he needed to see to satisfy his curiosity and settled back down in front of the fire.

 

All in all, it was a nice day for Gaara, if perhaps a trifle boring, but one can’t have everything. Reluctantly in the evening he stood again to go to dinner and listen to whatever story Draco wanted to regale him with about the assuredly _fascinating_ trip to the shops. As he neared the entrance of the tower, the red head heard shouting and then a sound like a lullaby to his accustomed ears: a blood curdling scream, which was then followed by some kind of ripping-fabric sound.

 

Gaara proceeded regardless and opened the portrait in time to see a strangely familiar dog run away down the stairs. At the sound of the portrait opening, above the sounds of shouting and roaring from the countless portraits that coated the stairwell, the dog turned back to look at who had emerged and appeared, if Gaara’s judgement of dog emotions was any kind of reliable source, surprised. He’d seen the same look once or twice when he’d used _shunshin_ to go and visit Fluffy.

 

Gaara wasn’t sure what was happening or why a dog wanted to get into Gryffindor (either that or the Fat Lady’s singing had done number on the poor creature’s ears) but the familiarity of the dog persuaded Gaara to chase after it to see if he could find some answers.

 

As he ran after it, Gaara considered where he could have seen it before. He’d only spent time with one dog that came to mind, and this one was quite a bit different. This big but nonetheless normal black dog with one head... hadn’t he seen a dog before he got to Hogwarts, back in Hogsmeade village? Why was it here now?

 

He continued to chase after the beast as the students were beginning to converge on the empty portrait of the Fat Lady.

 

It was going to be another long night, this time not only for insomniacs and part-time wolves.

 

To be continued...


	7. A New Tresspass

Gaara’s feet tapped against the polished stone floor in a steady drum as the frequency removed any distinction in his footfalls. The air in the castle was noticeably cooler after he’d spent the day in the amply heated Gryffindor common room, but his growing discomfort was pretty inconsequential seeing as he now apparently had a shy canine stalker to investigate.

 

The dog, no matter why it was there or who it belonged to, was definitely trying to evade him as every few minutes it would turn its head to glance back at him and then dart around another corner, as if it was trying to outmanoeuvre him. Gaara would have sent his sand out to snatch the dog off the ground, but experience told him that that often didn’t end well for smaller organisms with weaker bones.

 

He might have been able to catch up a lot quicker were it not for the labyrinthine design of the castle giving the nimble hound the advantage with its tight turns. Every time Gaara came close to the thing’s tail, it would disappear around a corner and Gaara would have to skirt around after it.

 

A subtle satisfied smirk eased its way onto Gaara’s face after he turned another corner and saw the long stretch of corridor in front of him and the dog, ending in what appeared to be a stairwell. Gaara had never had a dog before, Yashamaru having intended to buy him a puppy if he was still sane in a few years, but he was pretty sure that a dog this size needed to slow down before they went down stairs. This chase was over.

 

Giving one last push, Gaara burst forward and leapt at the still fleeing dog. The pooch had turned its head again, to check if Gaara was still following it, and this time it saw the looming figure of Gaara as he fell down on top of it.

 

The pair of them tumbled onwards a few more feet until Gaara was holding the dog’s midsection tightly, hoping it would calm down soon before he succumbed to the smell. This wasn’t wet dog; this was more like the stink of rotting dog. Even strays shouldn’t smell this bad. Even fluffy, three-headed monstrosity that he was, didn’t smell at all bad compared to this smelly mutt.

 

The big black dog continued to struggle and thrash about in Gaara’s arms for a little while before slowing to stillness. Gaara sighed a little, until the dog began to shift again, but it wasn’t panicky like before. The warm mass he was kneeling against, arms around the middle, moved in a fluid way that didn’t seem at all organic until he felt something circle his own abdomen. Confused, wondering how the emaciated beast had twisted itself into such a grapple, Gaara looked down to see not the bent ears and furry snout he had been chasing, but the long hair and smiling, earnest face of Sirius Black, infamous mass-murderer and inventor of the world’s most effective hangover potion (patent pending).

 

Before he’d known what was happening, he was being hugged back by Sirius and Gaara was more than a little surprised to see Sirius here... in his arms. The pause Gaara had taken to stare down at Sirius’ beaming face ended when he realised that surprise wasn’t the right reaction for this situation, indignity was what he should be experiencing. With that in mind, he let go of Sirius and stood up abruptly, letting his friend fall to the ground with a thud and an ‘oomph’.

 

“Nice to see you too, Gaara.”

 

Gaara waited until Sirius had righted himself and stalked off to the nearest empty store room to have a little chat. He had a few questions.

 

Safely sequestered, Gaara watched the frail man hold himself against the cold in the castle and considered him. He hadn’t known that wizards could transform into animals, but now that he thought about it, it made sense that magic could do something like transformations. Then Gaara wondered how Sirius had known that he was hiding in Gryffindor while everyone was away. It was bizarre.

 

Biting back against the cold that his meagre rags did little to protect him against, Sirius smiled and said “I’m glad to see you, how are you doing, Gaara?”

 

Gaara shrugged.

 

Sirius’ sunken cheeks stretched further upwards, seeing that Gaara’s demeanour hadn’t changed one iota, even after the fugitive had snuck into the castle in the middle of the day and had revealed that he was an animagus.

 

‘What are you doing here?’ Sirius hadn’t missed having to read through his conversations with Gaara. In his memories, Gaara seemed to speak without moving his lips.

 

At this particular question, Sirius deflated a little, his already listless shoulders drooped even further and he admitted to Gaara that had grown tired of waiting for Lupin to find the rat and had decided to do something for himself, for a change.

 

Gaara’s eyes widened a fraction and he realised that he had just happened to be in the wrong common room when Sirius broke in. Talk about coincidences... ‘So, how did you turn into a dog? You don’t have a wand.’

 

“Oh, that... do you know what animagi are?” Gaara shook his head and Sirius marvelled at the red-head’s ability to remain so stoic when confronted with the inexplicable and strange, even by wizarding standards. “Well, an animagus is a witch or wizard who has learnt a special sort of magic to turn into an animal. Once they know how to do it, they can transform even without a wand. To tell you the truth, that’s how I got out of Azkaban.”

 

‘Are you the same dog I met in Hogsmeade?’

 

Sirius wished Gaara’s face was made out of flesh and bone rather than stone and withering glares, because telling if he was angry about that whole episode or not was impossible. The only thing for it was the truth, and the hope that Gaara was willing to overlook whatever rudeness Sirius hadn’t bothered to notice. Even Sirius knew he was lying to himself, he was aware he’d obviously crossed the line, but any chance Sirius got he took to get out of that shack.

 

If he had to spend much longer in that creaky damned house, the shrieking it was famous for might just resume.

 

“Yeah, I, uh, wanted to get some fresh air and didn’t see any harm... I... you really know the right spot to scratch behind my ear.” The tick mark was actually reassuring to see on Gaara, since the boy usually externalised his anger in only one of two ways, physical violence and emotional displays of anger. The latter were rarer but oh so sweet. Forgiveness.

 

It wouldn’t occur to Sirius for a few months that his dynamic with Gaara would often flip to where he was the child and Gaara was the angry adults scolding him.

 

Gaara asked a little about how he was doing, out there in the cold, and then about tonight. Sirius explained how he’d been cold and hungry and had snuck into the school through one of the hidden passages with a plan to find Peter and finish this arc of his life. He’d be acquitted and he could set himself up in society again and buy a dozen steaks. Gaara was following him up until the point where Sirius admitted to stopping by the kitchens on the way to Gryffindor to get a bite to eat. He wouldn’t have believed anybody else if they said that.

 

“Now that I think about it, why were you in the Gryffindor common room today?”

 

Gaara blanked him for a few moments, coming up with a story, unbeknownst to Sirius, and then wrote out ‘I was there for the same reason as you. Searching for Pettigrew. While the students were in Hogsmeade.’

 

“Oh, good thinking! Just what I’d expect!” Sirius bellowed, clapping his hands. “I know it must be difficult, what Remus told me about, about your _home_ , but thank you for thinking about my situation. Did you have any luck?” Sirius didn’t sound too hopeful, knowing that Gaara probably wouldn’t have let him carry on without mentioning finding Peter.

 

The ragged convict was about to ask about Gaara, how he’d been doing, but Gaara held up his hands for silence and Sirius was still in admonished-child mode and hushed up immediately.

 

‘They’re coming.’ Sirius was disappointed and afraid, but Gaara opened the door and motioned for him to follow. Sirius wasted no time and jogged behind Gaara as they made their way to the nearest exit. Sirius could find a way out of the school’s perimeter soon enough.

 

When they reached the ground floor, Gaara opened a window and stepped back for Sirius to go through. He was about to, but he saw Gaara fiddling with something and then Gaara’s outermost layers came loose and were held out to Sirius, who wasn’t shivering but shaking in gratitude, and... maybe a little cold.

 

“Gaara... for me...? Thank-” Gaara pushed the cloaks at him and pointed out the window, already walking away, towards the voices that he’d heard and that had apparently followed him.

 

“I’ll see you again, Lily, soon!” Sirius jumped out into the snow and started off running towards the Whomping Willow and back to his temporary... home. He’d rather sit down for tea with that portrait his mother had commissioned.

 

Gaara meanwhile was walking back towards the voices of Lupin, McGonagall and a collection of student voices that he didn’t recognise. When they came into sight, both the adults and a couple of the mature students were pointing their wands right at him. Lupin called out for everyone to hold their fire, but his raised voice caused a particularly jittery seventh year to fire off whatever curse he’d been muttering, right at Gaara.

 

His sand blocked it with ease, but the fear evident of the seventh year’s face made it clear that he dearly wanted to raise his wand again to defend against _this_ imminent threat. Fortunately, Gaara saved himself any further curses by avoiding the weary glare he wanted to send at the fearful student, and instead walked slowly forward, knowing that most of the students considered him little better than Sirius Black (which he would argue against for very different reasons). Among the group he noticed most of the students crowding around him and the teachers as he had approached were Slytherins, and among them was Draco looking concerned and relieved. Honestly, even if Sirius was a reputed mass-murderer, Gaara was WAY more infamous where he came from.

 

Thirteen people... please...

 

“Gaara, where have you been?” McGonagall crossed her arms and he realised that whatever inquisition he’d be getting would happen right here.

 

His sand went as slowly as he could manage it, as to not instigate any more accidental magic or pants-wetting. ‘I was chasing someone. I think it was Sirius Black. He got away.’ A gasp went around the crowd, including Minerva who covered her mouth.

 

“You chased _after_ Sirius Black? What on Earth could have prompted you to do something so foolish?! Do you know how dangerous that man is?” McGonagall looked more angry than worried, so Gaara got a little confused about why she was shouting at him.

 

An older student stepped forwards, with a calculating look in his eye that was terribly misleading because he was actually a Gryffindor prefect, not a Slytherin. “Professor, apparently Gaara was seen running away from the entrance to the Gryffindor common room. Are we sure it wasn’t him that slashed the painting?”

 

All eyes turned to Gaara, even Remus’s, which looked more tired than even he was prone to. ‘I was already in the common room. I sat by the fire all day.’

 

There were a few scattered gasps and one of the minority of Gryffindors in the crowd exclaimed “Wait, that was _him_?!” It soon became clear that Gaara had indeed spent the better part of the day in the opposing House’s private area, since he’d been seen and he could account for some of the day’s foot traffic. It was finally McGonagall who asked why he had been in there in the first place and Gaara looked around quickly, wondering either what to say or how to escape.

 

Visibly annoyed to have to answer, he wrote out ‘I was cold. It’s warmer in there.’ More than a few among the crowd, especially those who had actually dealt with Gaara before, face-palmed.

 

Draco finally piped up “If Gaara really had anything to do with Black, surely he would have just let him in and stopped him from alerting everyone in the castle. Besides, Gaara would have known that Potter wasn’t there anyway.” If was precisely for times like these that Gaara’s friendship with Draco became worthwhile.

 

“I think that should allay everyone’s suspicions regarding Gaara’s whereabouts today.” Lupin said with a nervous little smile, a cold sweat making its way down the side of his face. The full-moon had been only yesterday and he really didn’t need this sort of drain. Stupid Sirius!

 

“Be that as it may, it is still against the rules to trespass in other Houses and so I will be taking fifty points from Slytherin.” A chorus of groans rose from the Slytherin students gathered. “But I hardly think it’s the right time to be standing around debating, when there could still be a wanted criminal roaming the halls. I think we’d best continue onwards to the Great Hall.”

 

No one argued against the aged lioness, and followed quietly behind her, with Professor Lupin walking at the back of the crowd. Gaara fell into step with Draco and his small band of friends, not engaging or taking notice of the conversations around him. All of the students present were laden with bags of varying sizes, having come straight from Hogsmeade when they were intercepted on their way down to the dungeons by the professors. The combined group had taken a longer route through the castle to pick up any stragglers still unaware of the dangers.

 

Draco glanced over to the red-headed bane of his peaceful school year and he marvelled at the audacity it took to brazenly stroll into their rival House and spend the day reading in front of their fire. It was beyond his logic, that’s what it was. However, as much as Draco wanted to be angry at the betrayal of his House, or incredulous at the simplicity it took to blindly seek out the warmest spots in the castle, the platinum-blond struggled to hold onto any of it. For one, Gaara was just that kind of boy, and Draco could also guess that his roommate might have been feeling a little homesick, with the weather conditions so alien to a desert dweller like him.

 

Maybe he could talk to the maintenance staff about warming up their bedroom, or getting one of the higher years to perform a long-lasting, powerful warming charm. Hell, in the summer holidays he could always splurge and send Gaara to Egypt for a couple of weeks. It was dirt cheap for wizards to stay in the desert country. Still, he’d have to look into organising something like that. Hell, while he was at it, maybe he could find out where Gaara came from, maybe take him back there for a visit or something.

 

Draco walked along, embarrassed by his surprisingly dim friend and making summer plans instead of quivering in fear at the mass murderer. He would have told anyone that cared to ask, which was no one at the moment, that this was just because he was perfectly unaffected by such menial troubles. Of course, anyone who actually knew Draco would have seen through that lie. The truth was that he wasn’t afraid of Sirius Black, and not just because Gaara was the most convenient bodyguard a friend could ask for; either Black was guilty of his crimes and he was loyal to the Dark Lord, in which case he’d be an ally of the Malfoy family, or he was innocent and didn’t kill people. Plus Black was a relative of his mother’s, he believed, so he had that going for him. He was pretty certain that as long as he gave Potter a wide birth, about the radius of a good-sized explosion spell, then he was pretty safe.

 

Draco hadn’t taken into account that residents of Azkaban habitually went insane within a few years of incarceration and his first cousin once removed might not be in the right mind to distinguish enemy from allied family and friends.

 

The doors to the Great Hall were being guarded by Professors Snape and Flitwick, with wands in hand and nervous eyes. Well, Flitwick’s eyes were certainly nervous, Snapes were edging towards eager. He was probably praying that Sirius was stupid enough to approach him so he could finish many of his sadistic little fantasies regarding his tormentors. Severus’ eyes hardened when he spotted Gaara among the crowd of Slytherins and other assorted students.

 

“That’s the last of them that we could find. I will continue searching the school with Remus, but I think Black has more than likely already fled the castle by now. Lock the doors after us, would you, Severus?” McGonagall shepherded the students into the bustling hall and walked back out of the closing doors, which were then locked with what looked to be a pretty elaborate locking mechanism. A locking mechanism that assuredly wouldn’t stand up to Gaara’s sand if he found out that the teachers did spot Sirius inside the school again and he had to race the staff to kill the idiot. _Stopping for dinner?!_

 

At least Lupin had looked appropriately chagrined by all of this. It seemed few people understood the burden of dealing with Sirius Black. If only Sirius _was_ just a simple mass murderer, it would make his life so much easier. Plus they’d have something in common.

 

The entire student body looked to be in a quiet panic about this latest trespass by Black, their previously safe haven now appearing scary and foreign to them. They all huddled in little groups and whispered and shook, the first years even occasionally breaking into tears and having to hide it from their friends. A few wary glances were sent to Gaara, but for once he got to experience what it was like not to be the scariest thing on people’s minds; though that waned a little as word spread that he’d either been in cahoots with Black, or had been scary enough to ward off the right-hand-man of Voldemort.

 

The festive floating jack-o’-lanterns had been taken down in light of the sufficiently terrifying events of the night, and the atmosphere of the Halloween feast, which Gaara had totally and completely forgotten about, was ruined for a third year in a row. What were the chances? First a troll in the dungeons, then a bloody message on the wall, and now a mass murdering psychopath breaking into the school. A few of the students began to wonder what could possibly go wrong next year to top this year.

 

In place of the tables that had been laden with sweet foods and even sweeter confectionaries, now stood row upon row of cots ready for the students to finish off this horrifying night with a horrible night’s sleep. Gaara wondered, as he wandered through the rows, why they couldn’t have just conjured up some more comfortable beds. Were they running low on magic-juice? Did magic run out? Gaara hadn’t really thought about it. All around him the students continued their excited chatter and Gaara lost his train of thought as Draco finished up his quick conversation with his other friends and jogged back over to him, brandishing a sizable bag that he’d pulled out of his rucksack.

 

“Here, I thought this might cheer you up since you weren’t allowed down into Hogsmeade.” Gaara was touched by the thought, until he saw it was a large sack of sweets. Not wanting to upset Draco or seem ungrateful, he nodded his insincere thanks, gave him a pat on the shoulder and took his bag of candy in hand and retired to his cot, which he’d selected because it was the furthest cot in the corner and was the least likely to upset the surrounding campers. He was a stoic boy, but most of the others in the hall were scared civilian children and the last thing they needed was the sand-wielding bogeyman sleeping amidst them.

 

He’d been walking across the hall with only his cot in mind, so that he could set down his bag of unwanted sweets and perhaps ‘forget’ to take them with him the next morning, but on his way to the drafty corner he ran into a face he thought he recognised somewhat. Apparently Gaara was familiar with her, though he couldn’t remember her name as she strode up to him with that same empty-headed smile she’d had the last time.

 

It was a strange name, something like Moon, or Luke, no that wasn’t it...Loon? Oh, wait, it was Luna. That girl who’d been bullied.

 

“Hello again, Gaara, how are you?” She said. Maybe she thought they were friends? Strange.

 

Still, blank-faced, he nodded his general acceptance of life and the world around him before nodding at her, asking the same question. Or at least that what she took it to mean. She told of how those girls had since left her alone and how she’d been pleasantly surprised by the amount of work her second year had brought her. All the while, Gaara was totally ignorant as to why this girl, that he met once (to their knowledge), was acting so familiar. It didn’t occur to Gaara for a moment that to her he was like an old friend, because he was one of the few people in the school that didn’t openly mock or shoot down her ideas/theories and had in fact helped her when others had been routinely bullying her. Gaara was strange and so was she, and so she continued to talk to Gaara, having been wanting to ‘catch-up’ for a while.

 

Dazed for a moment, Gaara noticed the weight in his hand and his eyes locked onto the sack of unwanted sweets and then roamed back up to meet with the glassy grey eyes and he figured that this was as good a use as he was going to get out of Draco’s gift, so he reached into the sack, grabbed a sizable handful of candies and held them out for Luna to take.

 

It stopped her speech eventually, as she took notice that Gaara wasn’t just standing there with that same impossible featureless expression on his face. She looked closer at whatever he was clutching in his hand and when she saw what it was, she smiled widely and thanked him profusely before depositing all but one into her pockets and starting on the first of her treasured gifts.

 

Giving her another nod, both in parting and in thanks for understanding that he would not have appreciated a hug for the sweets, Gaara turned around and continued on his way to his bed so he could relax marginally and open his current book. He didn’t bother turning around when he heard Luna, who was now sucking on the hard-boiled candy, following him sedately and all the while quietly telling him all about the wonderful and fictional creatures that either definitely or may live in the castle. He sat down on the most remote cot in the Great Hall, pulled out his book and began to read. Luna, meanwhile, took this as no kind of brush-off as Ravenclaws like her often multitasked and read while others were talking. Everyone seemed to do something else when she talked.

 

Intensely ignoring her as he was, Gaara paid no mind when Luna casually began discussing (quite one-sidedly) the focus of her latest research project: the strange creature she’d chased around the school on the night of the full-moon. If he had been paying attention, he might have had a hard time playing ignorant and not scowling at her when she described the thing as an abnormally large, sandy coloured red-panda of some sort. Apparently she thought his tanuki form and the red-pandas looked similar.

 

Oblivious as they both were, one engaged with his book and the other engaged with her new good friend, neither noticed the startled jump and gasp of Ginerva Weasley, who was stood close to the middle of the hall, surrounded by a group of other second-year girls.

 

“What’s the matter, Ginny?” One of the girls asked.

 

“I’ll be back in a second.” Ginny replied absently, not looking back to the other as she had already begun walking quickly towards her friend and the imminent threat that her friend was talking to. Knowing Luna, she probably didn’t know the stories about Gaara and how violent he was. With how annoying Luna could be, it was a wonder that Gaara hadn’t already gone for her since the blonde was chattering at full speed into his ear while he was trying to read.

 

She was almost jogging by the time she came to the end of the hall that was conspicuously empty except for Gaara and his conversational companion.

 

Luna was reciting the different avenues of research she had tried in classifying her newest ‘imaginary’ creature, when she was abruptly pulled to her feet and swung behind a ginger girl her own height. Gaara had noticed the fast approaching girl but didn’t think it was worth looking away from his book. He did glance up when the girl had reached them and pulled a surprised Luna behind her protectively. The look on the girl’s freckled face said it all: fear, anger, and courage. Looks that promised to cause him even more trouble. He again bemoaned his magnetic attraction to trouble. It was one thing to constantly get into trouble in his own world, where he was a warrior (and a murderous demon host), but in this world where he was a (supposedly) harmless child in a school surrounded by other children it was unbelievable.

 

“Hello Ginny, how are you?” Luna seemed oblivious, as usual, to Ginny’s alarmed stance and protective position.

 

“Stay there, Luna. Gaara’s dangerous, he attacked Harry and Professor Snape, and he killed a boggart.” She was panicked; that didn’t bode well.

 

Gaara had stopped reading, after finishing the sentence, marked his place in the surprisingly interesting tome and looked up at the disruptive pair of girls. He was glad to see that the red-head hadn’t drawn her wand as that would have surely led to a short battle followed by a long riotous frenzy among the inhabitants of the hall.

 

“He’s been very kind to me, Ginny. Are you sure you’ve got the right Gaara? He even gave me some sweets, would you like one?” Luna reached into her pockets and retrieved one to give to her friend, who was still glaring at Gaara uninterrupted. Ginny refused it, whether it was because it was from Gaara or because she was in the middle of a standoff it was hard to tell.

 

Finally she addressed the accused, “Why _were_ you in Gryffindor today? I heard you were in there all day. Were you waiting for Harry to come back? Were you going to attack him again?”

 

Gaara wasn’t really sure how to answer any of these questions so he sat quietly and tried not to look angry or aggressive at all. Hopefully Luna or someone would step in before this girl did something stupid. And why would he spend all day in one room waiting to start a fight with someone he’d already beaten?

 

The people in the outermost social circles, who were closest to the Gaara Exclusion Zone, were privy to what Ginny considered to be a long overdue chewing out. Ginny wasn’t raised to be hateful, she came from a tolerant and loving family, but she really hated bullies. Especially when those bullies went after her Harry!

 

“I’m not going to just let you attack my friends and get away with it!” People further afield had started to turn and watch the spectacle. “I think bullies are despicable.” Gaara didn’t know when he’d attacked Luna, nor when he’d become a bully, but it didn’t seem fair.

 

Ginny looked very upset and Luna was beginning to look a little concerned. Suddenly, Ginny let go of Luna’s wrist, stepped forward and shouted “Leave my friends alone!” And she slapped Gaara.

 

A gasp rose in symphony from the collected watchers and doubled when they all saw the small sand shield that had blocked Ginny’s attack. At the other side of the expansive hall, Harry, Ron and Hermione all started to running through the crowds toward Ron’s little sister.

 

Ginny had frozen, the adrenalin from her rant suddenly deserting her and leaving nothing but cold sweat in its place as she realised that the psychopathic boy that had fought the Boy-Who-Lived, Albus Dumbledore and Professor Snape, who had killed boggarts and (if the rumours were true) dementors, and had used his sand control to attack each time, was also the boy she had just tried to slap across the face. Suddenly the sand, deceptively soft, that her hand was still lightly touching against retracted and then retreated into the gourd on Gaara’s back without any kind of offensive action.

 

Ginny slowly, dazedly moved her hand back down and backed away from Gaara, never blinking or breaking eye contact for fear of breaking whatever peaceful spell had come over the terrifying Gaara. The spell was broken for Ginny when Gaara shifted to pick up his book again and started to read, totally ignoring her.

 

The crimson-haired boy had thought about saying something to her, but he figured it would have less of an impact if she had to read what he wanted to say in his defence. It wasn’t often that Gaara wished he to speak (or at all, as of the last few months), but increasingly of late he had found situations where the right words here or there would have helped his situation enormously.

 

With Gaara distracted again, Ginny took Luna by the hand again and dragged her back to the safety of the other side of the hall, where Ginny was worried over by both Ron and the twins while Luna continued to suck on her sweets and try to work out exactly what had led to that confrontation. She was also a little upset that Ginerva had tried to slap Gaara unprovoked, but then she was probably just being affected by an excess of wrackspurts making her do silly things for no reason.

 

Things in the Great Hall quietened down greatly after that and the cots began to fill up as the teachers began the long procedure of making the wizarding world’s largest slumber party go to sleep. Meanwhile, the children were all sat quietly talking amongst themselves from atop their beds for the night, and even the ones nearest Gaara felt brave and continued their own hushed conversations. Gaara felt, as he always did, the unwavering glances from the boys nearest to him, and in a moment of inspiration, he set his book face down and turned to find the bag of sweets he’d hidden from himself.

 

Looking up and around, he saw the largest cluster of teenagers huddled around on their cots, whispering excitedly, so he stood up and padded over to them. He was almost upon them when the ones facing his direction saw him and froze mid-speech, causing the other boys to turn around and freeze too. The mix of Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs were not the bravest and were among the vast majority of the school that outright feared the entity that was Gaara, so his unprompted approach in the middle of the night just before lights out was somewhat startling.

 

Gaara held out the sack to the closest boy and waited. It took a little while for the boy to both clock on to what was expected of him and to actually take the proffered sack from Gaara. The boy had expected any number of things to be contained within the sack, most of which being nightmarish and inexplicable, but he was surprised beyond words to find a large stash of good quality confectionaries from Honeydukes.

 

The fearful boy looked up at his scary benefactor but Gaara had already turned to go back to his bunk. He was free of the sweets, he’d done a good deed that might help to clear some of the miasma around his name, and he’d given tons of sugar to a bunch of school kids just before their bed time with only a few over-stretched adults to supervise the resulting sugar-rushing-mess. Worth it.

 

Wary of this new and unknown, _kind_ Gaara, the collected students did indeed begin to share out the sweets and called over a chorus of thanks before all ducking down a little when McGonagall shushed them harshly. Gaara sat back on his cot, cross-legged and settled in for a long night. He only had this one book to read and he was already halfway through to finishing it. If he’d known his day of lounging in Gryffindor would have extended to include the entire night on an uncomfortable bed surrounded and exposed to hundreds of others, he might have packed a few more books or some of his homework to do since he wouldn’t be going to sleep any time soon.

 

Draco had elected to stay with the Slytherins over on the other side of the hall, owing to a particularly riveting discussion of their upcoming Quidditch match and the season at large. He’d seen the tense standoff, but he hadn’t had a chance to move over there before the whole thing had resolved itself. He always tried to keep an eye on Gaara, since the boy was so very _foreign_ in so many of his ways and was prone to doing stupid things.

 

It was with these same vigilant eyes that he also noticed the astounding act of generosity on Gaara’s part after everyone had begun to settle down towards their cots. The wannabe-aristocrat of Slytherin was torn between annoyance at his own act of benevolence and charity being cast aside and re-gifted, to be consumed by ravenous younger years from different houses; on the other hand, Draco could plainly see that Gaara was attempting to buy these students’ favour with the confections. Such a Slytherin move. Draco was so proud.

 

Draco was so delusional...

 

Not long after he’d sat back down to read, the teachers patrolling the hall called out that Black had not been found in the school but the search would continue overnight, and that it was now time to go to bed. Minerva raised her wand and flicked it, blowing out every one of the floating candles (and not a drop of wax was spilt on a student, Gaara marvelled).

 

It was a stroke of luck that, though dim, the hall was lit enough by the light of the stars and the full moon through the invisible ceiling that Gaara was still able to read; he dreaded to think about how strained his eyes would be by the morning, though. As he read, he began to think on a number of recurring issues he’d been considering, like a new source of sand and when he’d next get a chance to visit Sirius.

 

A number of close-by students, excepting those that had received the sweets and goodwill from Gaara, noticed that the world’s shortest insomniac wasn’t going to sleep nor did he appear to have any intention to do so. The red head was visible in the moonlight, sat stiffly on his bed with a book on his lap, and those that saw his unblinking eyes found themselves fighting to stay awake as well. It seemed perilous to fall asleep when Gaara was in the same room as them and not planning on succumbing to slumber as well.

 

No one was in a position to laugh at the fact that Gaara was just as afraid of sleeping amongst them as they were of doing so in front of him. The only mirth to be had was Gaara’s silent smile as he saw the cluster of boys’ breathing even out one by one as they each lost in their attempt at the Olympic waking event. He was the undisputed champion.

 

It only took him another couple of hours to finish his book, before he carefully and quietly closed it and slid it under his cot and laid back. He stared up at the sky and wondered at some of the forms that magic could take. There was so much glitz and glamour, and curses and hexes, but the simple spell of seeing the stars and bright round moon through the ceiling of this school was really wonderful.

 

He stayed still and stared up into the sky for a while longer before anything else happened. The teachers, now that the last of the students had settled down to sleep (by appearance only for one), had started to wander through the aisles of children and softly converse about the day’s events, as if they weren’t surrounded by hundreds of nosy children, at least one of which was prone to insomnia.

 

It was as Gaara waited for the morrow, that he heard the distinctive Scottish whispering of Professor McGonagall, “There’s been no sign of him, but I am still not convinced it’s safe for the students to remain here for much longer. Sirius Black has proven that he’s capable of breaking out-of and in-to both Azkaban Prison and Hogwarts, and there’s no denying that he was violent, look at the way he threatened the House Elves in the kitchen, and that was all over a sandwich!”

 

Gaara just about stifled his groan and managed to cover his face-palm by turning over and pretending to be shifting in his sleep, as was his disbelief and bemusement at the incredibly stupid things friends of his got up to. Was there something about him that attracted idiots to him? At least Draco was a little more mature, though some of his idiotic rivalries and behaviours still gave cause for doubt.

 

Gaara was many things, but humble really wasn’t one of them.

 

His movement, innocuous though it was, apparently drew the adults’ attention to him. Snape turned to Minerva and Albus and sneered in true form, “Was there ever a doubt in your mind that Black was up to no good? Even before he did away with Pettigrew, he was rotten to the core. When I mentioned inside help, I didn’t just mean the obvious suspect among our own ranks. Does anybody else find it suspicious that just a little while after Sirius Black escapes Azkaban, an undeniably suspicious and unaccountable child is found wandering in the village close to the school that Sirius Black has now broken into, and that this same boy is the one that was involved in the incident concerning Black earlier this evening? How do we know that he didn’t at least help Black escape the castle, if not helping him to enter in the first place?” It was chilling that Snape had stayed so quiet while he was angrily ranting, so cold.

 

“Severus, you really must try to find some forgiveness in yourself, especially for one of your own. All of those grudges will fester.” Minerva sounded more like a teacher admonishing a student rather than an irate colleague arguing with an unreasonable man.

 

“Well,” he drawled, “you’re more than welcome to take him off my hands, if you think you could do better for him than me. What do you say?” He clearly had a big bitter smile on his face from the smarm in his voice, almost certainly stretching upwards when he was met by no answer.

 

Before McGonagall could shamefully refuse to take Gaara into Gryffindor, Dumbledore spoke in his own whispering voice, “Now, Severus, Minerva, you both know you can’t just up and trade your students... not anymore...” The slow footsteps finally took the three teachers out of earshot and Gaara found that he did actually feel a little insulted that the usually magnanimous Minerva McGonagall hadn’t been willing to, at least in principle if not practice, take him into her House.

 

The collected professors were none the wiser that they had just been eavesdropped upon, nor that they would then walk over to where Harry Potter would be able to hear Snape’s next theory: that both Gaara and “another within the castle” (read: Remus-bloody-Lupin) were in on the break-in, though without mentioning either by name. Still, it was enough for Harry to consider Gaara with a little more suspicion than hostility from then on.

 

The next morning, the students were released from lockdown to return to their dormitories and prepare for the day while the cots were switched out for the tables again, in time for breakfast. Relief abounded when it was announced that Sirius Black had not been found lurking in the castle overnight and that security had been stepped up, but the tension was still high for the upper years and a select few in the lower ones that felt the ongoing threat more acutely.

 

Gaara overheard Harry Potter, as they were leaving the Great Hall, say to his female friend, “They didn’t find the Basilisk either.”

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Gaara knocked lightly on the door, trying not to disturb the teacher that looked suspiciously hung-over.

 

“Oh, Gaara, good afternoon. Is this one of your free periods too?” Lupin sat up straight and managed to push himself to his feet without making too much guilt-inducing noise.

 

Gaara nodded and entered the classroom. He’d been waiting all day for the time to come and relay what happened the night before.

 

“I gather you saw a dangerous and _stupid_ escaped convict last night. What happened?”

 

Gaara sighed a little and uncorked his sand. ‘He snuck in as a dog, to steal the rat. The painting stopped him and I chased him. I helped him to sneak out of the castle.’ Gaara figured the bare bones would suffice until Lupin had a chance to go and find out directly from Sirius what had happened, after lengthily chewing him out, probably.

 

“Stupid, arrogant, self-absorbed...” Lupin’s headache didn’t stop him from grumbling with all he was worth, growling out the string of insults that included a few barely audible ones that the seasoned shinobi had never heard before. Lupin closed his eyes and exhaled slowly, trying to calm himself down before he ran out into the snow and hunted down the idiot himself. Gaara could blame him as the impulse was hard to resist.

 

Gaara actually had to hold Lupin back after he told him about Sirius’ initial stop off at the kitchens for a spot of dinner before searching for their friends’ betrayers. Trying to distract the teacher from doing what he too wanted to go out and do to their mutual friend, Gaara asked him, ‘What did you do yesterday?’ It might also forestall any further judgements on how the cold red-head had spent his day.

 

Lupin took a moment to register the words’ presence and then another to absorb them before he could turn to Gaara with a smile on his weary face and say, “Harry came to see me yesterday, since he wasn’t allowed to go and visit Hogsmeade with everyone else.” For the first time in weeks, Lupin was displaying some vitality that wasn’t well-aimed aggression towards Sirius.

 

“He said he wanted to know about his parents, about James and Lily. It was nice to be able to tell him about them; he looks so much like James it’s very strange for me, and he has Lily’s kindness. He got the best of both, you could say, James’ looks and Lily’s personality. Honestly, sometimes I struggle separating Harry from my memory of James. I keep expecting him to tell me to hurry up and get Sirius and Peter so we can go and make some mischief. I suppose that might be the reason that Severus has such a problem with Harry. I’m ashamed to admit we gave him a hard time when we were younger.”

 

Gaara wondered what, then, was the reason for Snape’s outright animosity towards _him_?

 

‘Did Lily, Harry’s mother, join you in bullying Professor Snape?’ He apparently looked an awful lot like this Lily person (enough, at least, to keep reminding him about the similarity), but the look on Lupin’s face said that he was wrong.

 

Lupin had creased his brow in thought as he was clearly trying to find the right way to say something. “No, that’s certainly not right. In fact, Lily was usually the one that told us off for... bullying Severus.” Lupin clearly didn’t like to think of his childhood teasing as anything that serious, but the man did know that what he and his friends had done was wrong. “Lily and Severus Snape used to be friends, a long time ago. They had a falling out, but Lily was unquestionably kind to everyone. I’m not one hundred percent sure why Severus – Professor Snape has taken such a disliking to you, but I really don’t think that it is because of her.”

 

Well, that was disappointing. He thought he finally had that one pinned down.

 

Lupin and Gaara talked for a little longer about Harry and his parents until Draco poked his head through the door, after knocking politely. “Finally! For someone as notorious as you are, Gaara, it’s surprisingly difficult to find you. Good afternoon, Professor. I’m sorry to interrupt,” He really wasn’t, “-but Gaara has another lesson and Professor McGonagall really doesn’t like it when Gaara ditches class.”

 

He did it often enough that McGonagall always held off on performing the register every class so that the strangely absent-minded boy could have a final chance to make it to her class.

 

“Of course, of course, he’s all yours. It’s been nice speaking to you, Gaara. I’ll see you again tonight for the lesson. We’ll be working on your wordless-casting theory, unless you would rather take the night to rest after yesterday’s excitement.” Gaara figured he’d had more ‘conversations’ since becoming mute than he’d ever had as an audible person. He didn’t spare the offer of a night’s rest much thought and offered no more than a nod in reply before leading Gaara out of the room.

 

Lupin was going to have to wait in his office at their usual time to see if Gaara would show up.

 

As they walked briskly towards the nearest stairwell, Draco said, “I didn’t get a chance to say it last night, but well done. If one of those Weasley paupers tried to hit me with their unwashed hands, I definitely would have struck back. Especially if I had your sand. I don’t suppose you could tell me how to do what you do?”

 

Gaara shook his head.

 

“Shame. Still, I’m glad you _didn’t_ hit her back or anything. People are already avoiding you.” Gaara couldn’t agree more. He was a little offended that people around him, even those as close as Draco, believed that he would attack a little girl at the slightest provocation. It was as if all of the personal development that he’d undergone meant nothing, as if his past was this transparent. But, there still seemed to be a fundamental misunderstanding of his power floating around.

 

‘My sand isn’t an offensive weapon.’ Gaara wondered if he could get a bell, or perhaps a charm, that would alert people to when he had written out a message as the pair walked for a fair distance before Draco, uncomfortable with the silence (figuratively speaking), glanced at Gaara and spotted the message.

 

Draco couldn’t believe that the sand wasn’t a weapon, not for a second. However, Gaara had never really seemed like the type of person that lied, but then maybe he was a just an exceptionally good at it.

 

‘In my home, it is called the Ultimate Defence.’ It was a shield his mother had given him, that his father had given him, that Shukaku had given him, that would protect his body from all harm, and it left his heart all the more open to pain. Now things had shifted and his heart was protected by others, as his sand stretched out to protect his precious people. ‘It automatically responds to threats to me. With it, I can protect those I care about also.’

 

The previously self-absorbed prig, Draco thought about this as it was the exact sort of thinking he had decried Potter spouting off about for the past couple of years, but coming from Gaara it seemed a lot less (for lack of a better term) _courageous_. From Gaara it seemed more like a thoughtful ideological position rather than the idiotic default position of the Lions. Draco wondered if he would, when presented by a threat to Gaara, or his mother and father, or someone else close to him (no one came to mind), would he stand up to fight on their behalf?

 

They were quite late to class and Professor McGonagall did not accept Draco’s excuse of fetching Gaara or Gaara’s excuse of not looking her in the eye and pretending not to hear her demand an explanation. To be fair, the red-head’s wasn’t much of an excuse, but she still didn’t press him about it.

 

With any other teacher, letting Gaara slide where she would almost definitely have given another student a tongue lashing, would have seemed like an act of cowardice of self-preservation, but with the revered lioness of Gryffindor certainly was not one to bow to fear. Especially when that fear came in the teeny-tiny package of a thirteen-year old, orphaned(?) mute boy. Minerva didn’t do anything because she had no real recourse to take. She really doubted that Gaara would care if she shouted any of her well-meaning scolding at him, and he already willingly (for the most part) volunteered to spend hours after school in the presence of teacher to improve his spellcasting. She couldn’t, and wouldn’t corporally punish him, and it wasn’t nearly severe enough to trouble the Headmaster about.

 

So she shot both Gaara and Mr Malfoy dirty looks and continued with her class, pretending not to hear Mr Weasley complain that now she’d _also_ started to favour the Slytherins.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

It was the last official event of the year in Hogwarts for most of the students who would be returning home soon, and it was immensely important for Draco, but even with this in mind Gaara looked down through the gale and the darkness to the sodden Quidditch field that housed both the Gryffindor and Slytherin teams and considered whether Draco would even see him in the stands enough to miss him if he snuck off. From the towering wooden structure where he was sitting, the grass field might as well have been empty for all that he could see. So it was no surprise that he was the only one up there holding onto a magically reinforced umbrella with all of his strength that, thanks to the wind, didn’t keep him at all dry.

 

Weren’t there deserts in this world that he could have been sent to instead of the Scottish highlands?

 

Through the wind he thought he could see the briefest flash of orange or gold, from the bright Gryffindor uniforms, but that was swallowed up in the blink of an eye. If he saw as little of the game as he did of the opening ceremony, Gaara was going to go back inside and tell Draco he had sat there for the full... how long did Draco say Quidditch matches lasted for?

 

Before he could recall that Draco had told him that Quidditch matches could go on for hours until the Snitch was caught, he was interrupted when a shaggy black dog jumped up the final steps into the stands and trotted along to sit by his feet. Gaara looked down at Sirius imperiously, thinking the man was foolish to sneak back onto the school grounds just to watch his godson’s first game of the year. Derision or no, Gaara’s hand still absently scratched behind the soaked dog’s ear as Gaara finally caught a glimpse of something bright green below. He was in the right Quidditch stadium, then. 

 

At least Sirius had had the basic cognitive functions going on that he knew to come as a large scary dog instead of a large scary mass murderer. Plus Sirius’ waterproof fur would have been a godsend for Gaara on that evening. The resounding whistle blow interrupted Gaara’s thoughts just as he arrived at a half-thought out wish to be in his tanuki form with its own warm, water resistant fur and squishy tail to sit on. The match had apparently started and the players had ascended into the air, drawing to a close the window for Gaara’s escape when Draco flew passed his tower along with the rest of the Slytherin side and saw Gaara sitting there. Glancing down after they had gone by, Gaara saw that Sirius had fortunately been lying down at that moment, scratching behind his own ear, so none of the team had seen the suspicious, big dog sat contentedly next to the terrifying, suspicious little transfer student.

 

The match dragged on for longer than Gaara cared to guess whilst he huddled against the cold. Was his friendship with Draco really worth this? It wasn’t like Draco would stop being his friend if he left, right? Eventually a lone green flyer floated by the stand in a lazy, wandering manner, and lo and behold it was Draco. The blond was clearly searching very hard through the rain to see the little golden ball that had swooped by Gaara about twice.

 

Draco’s back was to them for a few minutes, the Seeker using the tower as a wind shelter, but finally he turned to peek at who, if anyone, was using this tower, only to see the blaring red hair and pale white skin of his best friend. Draco could see even from where he was flying how miserable Gaara was and what sort of mood Gaara was going to be in that night, whether or not they won the match. The loyal Slytherin just couldn’t see his roommate getting excited over a sporting success. In spite of Gaara’s frown, Draco dutifully waved at him and got a short one back.

 

Through the dark, Draco saw the head of the black dog poking up over the wall of the stand, sitting next to Gaara, and he pointed at it in question. Gaara saw Draco pointed beside him, turned and saw the dog and shrugged in Draco’s direction. A noncommittal shrug was his best defence at a time like this; he could pretend the stray had wandered up there coincidentally. He could have told Draco that the dog had been attracted by his inexplicable animal magnetism but he wasn’t quite willing to admit to that one just yet, plus it still made no sense to him. Draco seemed to accept this, or was distracted by still being in the middle of a match, and flew away again to continue his snitch hunt.

 

Another hour _flew by_ before Harry caught sight of the snitch again and he darted after, but it disappeared when he reached the side of the field. He stayed still for a few moments before twisting and flying directly upwards, along the side of the tower and into the sky above to find a vantage point, not that he’d been able to see anything from a distance at all that game.

 

It was a brief moment, not much longer than a lightning strike, but as he’d darted passed the stands at the top of the tower, he thought he’d seen a very ominous sign. His mind must have been playing tricks, his denial could not see a way it could be true, that there had been a Grim sitting and watching him and next to it had been Gaara! It just wasn’t possible.

 

Harry was just about to turn his broom around, to go back and check to see if his newest enemy was in cahoots with his death omen, when he spotted a glint of gold that wasn’t one of the Weasley twins, as it had been half a dozen times before. He set off immediately to chase the orb into the worsening weather above them and only belatedly noticed that Malfoy had seen it as well as was also going for the snitch.

 

The pair of Seekers raced up into the dark and storming clouds, dodging stray coats and flying umbrellas as the wind sent missiles to dissuade them. It was soon clear that despite Draco’s superior broom, Harry was the better flyer of the two as he pulled out in front, his arm already reaching for the snitch.

 

Draco followed only milliseconds after, but he held his hands back and clutched onto is broom tightly, seeing the water running off of it turning to ice in what he thought was the winter’s chill. It was only as the pair broke through the cloud line at breakneck speed that they saw a sight that filled them with dread before the effects of the dozens of dementors took hold of them.

 

Harry’s previous encounters with the misery monsters had proven that he had an extra susceptibility to them, so he fell within moments of their icy reach gripping at his mind, but it was not much longer, as Draco tried to turn around and fly back downwards, that he too succumbed to the amassed and multiplied effects of the prison guards. Draco had turned ad just begun to fly straight back through the cloud line, with no thought spared for his classmate who was falling unaided, as the fear and darkness that was attacking his soul was beyond any he had felt and he knew he had to get away. He didn’t make it to the clouds again before darkness crept in and he lost his grip on his Nimbus 2001 and fell too, just before the rotted hands of the nearest dementor were able to clasp him to their tormenting embrace.

 

The entire Quidditch stadium had gone from cold to icy in an alarming speed that precious few understood quickly enough to summon their Patronuses in defence. The first dementors breached the line of visibility at the same moment as the first of the two plummeting teens. Having watched Draco and their Gryffindor Seeker fly upwards a few moments ago in a rare spate of calm in the storm, Gaara jumped to his feet when he saw someone falling and instinctively sent out his sand to catch them, forcing as much chakra as he could spare to harden it against the onslaught of rain. Harry, his uniform now recognisably not Draco’s, fell into the soft clutches of Gaara’s sand arm and Gaara began to retract the appendage, seeing that he had no time to spare with all of those pesky dementors swarming from up on high. Speaking of... where was...?

 

A jolt to Gaara came when he saw a second falling boy approaching the ground, on the other side of the stadium and a long way from him. Gaara calculated, at speeds that belied his mediocre mathematical skills, whether even by dropping Harry there he could reach Draco before he impacted on the insufficiently softened muddy field. No chance. He tried to think of something he could do, something he could use, but nothing would work.

 

He thought he heard a low voice coming through the rain but his mind focussed on how, in his panic, Draco seemed to be falling in slow motion. It was remarkable that the dementors and rain seemed to speed up proportionally. Wait! Draco had actually slowed down! Someone on the other side of the wooden structure, in one of the other towers had cast some sort of spell. Thank goodness.

 

With that considerable worry out of the way, Gaara was still feeling quite fuelled by adrenalin and upset that his friend had almost been killed by these cloaked nuisances, so he dumped Harry into the stands beside him and sent out his sand in a set of super-dense spears to tear the closest dementors apart. It was not the most efficient use of his abilities, but in the conditions he didn’t have much choice in his usage.

 

As he manipulated the trajectory of the lances to swoop as fast as the retreating players, to attack any of the monsters that came too close to him or his side of the stadium, Gaara turned to see Padfoot sniffing Potter and licking his nose concernedly but he nudged the worried dogfather with his foot and pointed to the stairs. These guards were on a feeding frenzy among the bright-eyed students, but they would have a field day if they found the escapee they were actually supposed to be looking for.

 

The number of dementors was clearly beyond his meagre abilities in this weather, so it came as a relief to Gaara when a blinding silver light began to wave and radiate from the other side of the stadium from the general vicinity that Draco had fallen into. The brilliant light crashed into the dementors buzzing about the place and sent them flying in pain that Gaara hadn’t thought possible for the soulless wraiths.

 

The source of the light began to dim only after the last of the black hoods had fled the area and everything seemed to return to a calmness that ignored the raging storm still going on. Gaara called back his flying sand and refilled his gourd before turning to his good deed for the day. Potter was asleep it seemed, but slapping didn’t rouse him so Gaara threw him over his narrow shoulder and began to walk down the unnecessarily tall staircase. At least it was dry and secluded from the violent winds, but it still wasn’t gratifying to know that of all the people he could have rescued from plummeting to their deaths, it was probably the second most antagonistic person in the school. If it had been Snape, he might have seriously considered just pitching him off the side of the tower and pretending he’d missed the catch.

 

He carried Harry down and out of the stadium, into the throngs of panicking students who had only just overcome the trauma induce by Sirius Black’s break in, and to the front of the crowd where the staff were discussing the situation heatedly and glancing around frantically, on the lookout for any more dementors. McGonagall, who had been levitating Draco’s fitfully sleeping body and talking to Snape, spotted Gaara incoming and let out a great breath of relief when she recognised her missing student draped over his shoulder.

 

Gaara stooped down to drop Harry to the floor as gently as he could, within the bounds of his patience and short lived benevolence, before he walked to Draco’s floating side to check he too had survived the fall without any major injury. It didn’t escape his notice that the Granger girl was thanking him profusely while she fussed over Harry, nor did he miss the scowl on Weasley’s face even now. Gaara had no time to give to receiving such praise, or animosity, as he wanted to get out of the rain and the staff had begun a procession towards the castle, McGonagall guiding the two hovering, unconscious teens with them.

 

Gaara wasn’t too worried about Draco, he just seemed to have passed out, but the look on Dumbledore’s face was really quite something. He’d seldom seen his own father that angry, and with the level of respect that this headmaster received, which his father often didn’t achieve, it was interesting to think that such a kind and powerful old man might have finally gotten angry. It was unfortunate that the ancient wizard took off towards his office as soon as they entered the school, as Gaara would have liked to have seen what happened when Albus Dumbledore worked out some of his aggression.

 

He ignored Flint and the other Quidditch players as they lead the rest of the House back to the dorms, and instead followed McGonagall to the Hospital wing. He wasn’t worried about Draco, he was just very cold and thought Pomfrey might have a potion or a better heater for him to warm up with.

 

Madam Pomfrey was more than willing to give Gaara a bed for the night, since his forehead felt like it was made of cold stone (which it just happened to be made out of), but she kicked both Hermione and Ron out of the ward after an hour, eliciting a fair few impertinent questions as to why the likely serial killer was allowed to stay and not them but she just huffed and slammed the door after them.

 

She turned to him and gave him a consoling smile before attending to Harry, the Mediwitch pretending not to have seen the little smile Gaara displayed in return. Gaara took the bed next to Draco’s, for no real reason, really, and sat down. He was up to date with his homework so he didn’t have anywhere better to be, and he didn’t have any other friends to talk to, so he had nothing better to do. He just sat there and waited, coincidentally facing in the direction of Draco’s bed.

 

Gaara was knocked out of his trance when the doors opened and Lupin poked his head in, turned to him and then gestured for him to follow the man out. Gaara gave Draco one last look and stood to leave.

 

Outside of the Hospital Wing, Lupin closed the door gingerly and moved a few steps further away, “Sorry about the cloak and dagger routine,” He whispered, “Madame Pomfrey was here when I was a schoolboy and she’s not gotten any kinder with age.” Gaara wondered why he got special treatment. “I wanted to say well done earlier, saving Harry and all. Really well done.

 

“The dementors weren’t supposed to be on the grounds today and they most certainly weren’t meant to attack. Dumbledore is furious, as I’m sure you can imagine. The only one who is making more of a fuss, I hear, is Draco’s father. Apparently Mr Malfoy has already heard about his son’s fall and wanted to remove him from the school tonight. Professor Dumbledore said he was doing everything he could to calm any concerned parents, but all the same, things are tense.”

 

‘Sirius was there.’ Lupin had to squint to see the letters in the dark of the hallway.

 

“What? What do you mean Sirius was there? Where?”

 

‘In the stands, with me. He watched the game. He got away.’

 

“I’ll go check on him, and this time I’ll impress upon him not to try sneaking back into the school again. He’s getting reckless.” Lupin flashed that same look that Dumbledore and Lucius Malfoy had been wearing all evening but the look passed and he glanced back to Gaara, “Are you going to stay here tonight or are you going back to your dormitory? I can give you a pass so you won’t get stopped by Filch or Severus; a night like this and he’s bound to be prowling the halls.”

 

Gaara shook his head and turned around and walked back into the infirmary without a by-your-leave. He didn’t feel like walking back to his room tonight, he could sleep just as well in one of the Medical Wing’s beds, or stay awake as he ended up doing. It wasn’t often that he couldn’t get to sleep no matter how much he tried, so it was quite perplexing as he lay in the bed next to Draco’s why he was unable to drift off.

 

It was so frustrating, that this pit in his stomach was taking the place of the ill-tempered demon bound to his soul was ridiculous. It wasn’t like he had anything to worry about, he was safe. He was almost tempted to use his _Forced Sleep_ technique, but that jutsu might still have the nasty side effect of releasing Shukaku. He hadn’t tested that.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

At breakfast, the atmosphere permeating the Great Hall was tense once again, and the staff were just as much to blame as the students. Collective feelings of fear had not been this high since the Basilisk attacks last year had started and students had been petrified left and right, now that the so called protection their trusted Ministry had provided had turned out to be more of a threat to their health than the murderer that had broken in. The children, normally shouting across tables and excitedly chattering away, were whispering and huddling and looking to the staff table for some kind of official reassurance.

 

The owl post had been cancelled that morning to spare the upset castle’s occupants any further unrest, which was assured when the torrents of letters from concerned or irate parents would arrive. There would be time for that in the coming days. After a series of pointed looks from Minerva, Severus, Pomona and Filius, Albus stood from his throne at the head of the hall and waited for the few remaining students to cotton on and hush up along with everyone else that had already avidly watched him.

 

“I believe apologies are in order,” Dumbledore began, “on behalf of both Hogwarts and the Ministry of Magic, who are not here to say it. The Dementors strayed onto the grounds of the school yesterday, pursuing Sirius Black, and in so doing they trespassed onto the Quidditch field in the course of the game and as a result two players were sent to the Hospital Wing and the game was cancelled. I cannot stress how much worse things might have gone, but as the headmaster of the school and the person who permitted the Dementors to guard us, the responsibility falls to me to say sorry to you, the students who could have been hurt.” The students and the staff had not seen this coming. Albus was a revered veteran and seasoned and respected politician on top of being the most powerful wizard still in action, so such a profound apology for the Minister of Magic’s mistake was humbling for the student body.

 

It was also unsettling, seeing the, in some eyes, god-like man acting so unreservedly.

 

“The wards of Hogwarts castle have been modified and the Dementors have been banished from the grounds for the time being. They will not be allowed to attack any students again.” Albus looked back at his ornate chair and was about to sit back into it but stood straight at the last moment. “Ah, I almost forgot; the Quidditch match yesterday has been postponed for the time being and the season will be resumed in the New Year when the Seekers from Slytherin and Gryffindor have had time to recover and replace their lost brooms.” Albus sat back finally, listening to the greatly missed excited chatter as it flooded the hall again. If there was one thing that could get his students talking again, it was Quidditch.

 

He was too old for sleepless nights, he had been for sixty years, but last night he had spent the dark hours shouting irately at Fudge, Scrimgeour and the Dementor wranglers from Azkaban over the unforgivable lapse the day before. He would have mentioned it to the students, but he didn’t want to terrify them by revealing just how scared he was of how close they had come to being hurt. The dementors had number in the dozens and had encompassed the field, attacking the students indiscriminately, not Sirius Black. It had been a mixture of luck and intervention from Gaara that prevented anybody from dying or worse before he was able to send out his Patronus to clear the stadium. He hadn’t even seen Harry falling through the gale, his old eyes hiding behind his half-moon spectacles were no longer the eagle-eyed instruments he’d used to defeat Gellert.

 

That boy attacks Harry Potter, battles his Head of House and Headmaster, chases off Sirius Black, saves Harry from falling to his death and protects surrounding students from Dementors. If only he’d just pick one path so Albus could devise a strategy to deal with him.

 

Hagrid approached Hermione and Ron, spotting them along the Gryffindor by their distinctive hairs. Both the teenagers looked up at their friend turned professor with hopeful looks, having mentioned to him the night before that Harry’s broom had been blown away during the upheaval the day before and asked him to keep an eye out for it.

 

“Morning, Ron, Hermione. How are you today?” Hagrid only engaged in small talk when he was nervous about something, and since his beard wasn’t singed he hadn’t procured another dragon’s egg. Before either Ron or Hermione could answer what to them was a simple enough pleasantry, Hagrid cracked, “Oh, who am I kidding? You know why I’m here. I found Harry’s broom.”

 

Despite Hagrid’s odd panic, both of the two thirds of the Golden Trio present were visibly elated to hear that Harry’s Nimbus 2000 had been recovered safely. They had feared it might days or weeks to retrieve the broom. Their strings were cut when Hagrid leaned forward between them and deposited the pile of kindling he’d had hidden in his enormous palm.

 

“Oh my goodness! Hagrid, what happened?” Hermione turned back to Hagrid. Ron just continued to stare at the broken bits of broom and twig that Hagrid had thoughtfully collected.

 

“Well, I was looking around the grounds, mostly for any stray Dementors and the like, when I saw the Whomping Willow hitting something on the ground near its roots. I was worried it was one of the children, see, so I ran to check. I think Harry’s broom must have blown into the Whomping Willow in the storm, and that tree’s never taken too kindly to things landing on it...”

 

Ron finally dejectedly spoke, “Harry’s broom...” There might have been a tear in his eye.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Harry was the first to wake up in the Infirmary and his first instinct, other than to check for any missing limbs or a stray house elf was to escape Pomfrey’s clutches before the tyrannical healer could insist on any number of Pepper Up potions or those disgusting nourishment draughts. He ran for the exit as soon as the kindly but overbearing woman’s back was turned, passing a single closed curtain before making it to the door. He wondered who was behind the curtain, whether someone had managed to hurt themselves between whenever he had arrived and now. His experience with Gaara earlier in the term had taught him not to go sneaking into other people’s hospital areas uninvited.

 

It was rather disorientating since Harry wasn’t too sure what day it was nor how he had ended up in the Hospital Wing as he wandered through the empty castle halls. Not until he reached the Great Hall did he recall the disastrous turn the Quidditch match had taken, but beyond falling off his broom and the Dementors  attacking, it was all a bit of a mystery.

 

Hermione and Ron saw him approaching and swept something behind themselves before he was able to get a closer look at it. He sat down with a huff, ignoring the cheers and well wishes from his housemates around him until he could find out what had happened. It was a great relief to hear that he had only slept through the night, pleasant surprise considering how prone to nightmares the boy-who-lived happened to be.

 

“What happened?” His green eyes bore into his friends’, skipping as much preamble as he could afford for the moment, desperate as he was to discover what had happened after the match. He’d been happy to see what appeared to be the entire student body at breakfast, not half missing and soulless.

 

“Well, you see...” Ron was clearly the more reluctant of the pair as Hermione quickly interjected from his pause.

 

“Yesterday, the Dementors attacked the match, they shouldn’t have even been on the grounds! You were knocked off your broom I think, or you fell-”

 

“Harry didn’t fall!” Ron’s indignant defence of his flying skills was truly endearing to Harry.

 

“Fine, Harry was knocked off his broom, Ron, and you were falling from so high... It was on the far side of the stadium where there weren’t so many people and, well...” Hermione looked to Ron nervously, uncharacteristically unsure of herself. Harry thought they were going to tell him that no one had caught him and that he was a ghost now.

 

Ron took his cue from there to be as blunt as only he could be, “Gaara caught you like a Quaffle, he used his sand, though. It was lucky he did, otherwise you would have, you know...” Harry was shocked; about as shocked as if he had been told he was indeed dead. Of all people to save him, he would have figured Lucius and Draco Malfoy working together to catch him would have been more likely.

 

“I fell... what happened to the match? Did they continue? Don’t tell me that Malfoy caught the Snitch! He _would_ have to wait until I was unconscious to find it.” Harry’s mood turned south as the possible outcomes from yesterday all seemed to be negative. Unless he’d caught the Snitch unconsciously as he was falling...

 

Before he could ask about his potential sleep-Seeking, Ron continued, “Since Malfoy fell too-”

 

“Malfoy fell too? When?”

 

“Same time as you or just a bit after. Dumbledore caught him, and then the game was cancelled and everyone was called inside.”

 

“I’ve never seen Professor Dumbledore so angry! He banished all of the Dementors from the grounds after saving Malfoy from falling. From what I hear, Gaara also fought off some of the Dementors on the other side of the stadium after he caught you.” Hermione said.

 

“Wait, you’re telling me that Gaara saved my life and protected everyone else? What about the Grim?” Harry asked, standing up a little to peak over the heads around him to see where Gaara and Draco were sitting. He didn’t spot the distinctive blond and red anywhere.

 

“He’s not here. I overheard Millicent Bullstrode saying that Gaara sat with Malfoy in the Infirmary all night.” Hermione said, noticing Harry’s searching gaze.

 

“Madame Pomfrey let him sleep in the Infirmary?” Ron said, though nobody needed to air the ongoing question that was Gaara’s friendship with Draco, as Slytherin social-politics would always confuse Gryffindors.

 

“I heard he doesn’t sleep that often. He probably has insomnia.” Hermione ignored Ron mouthing the word ‘insomnia’ to Harry, “What were you saying about a Grim, Harry? I hope you aren’t buying into Professor Trelawney’s so-called prophecy. You heard what she said to Gaara, and that was obviously fake.”

 

“I saw the Grim sitting with Gaara in the stands when I was flying around!”

 

“Harry, Gaara was alone in that stand, people saw him bring you down alone. Are you sure you saw what you think you saw? The rain was really coming down and it was pretty hard to see anything.”

 

“I’m sure Hermione, it was a big black hound sat next to Gaara.” Harry was more confused than anyone about what had happened the day before. “So I fell... what about my broom, did anyone find it?”

 

Harry’s first clue was Ron, who looked absolutely wretched, “About your broom, it kind of got blown into the Whomping Willow...” He pulled the bundle of kindling back into view, “And you know how it can be.”

 

Harry was devastated to see what had become of his first broom, his first real present, excepting the cake Hagrid had given him on his eleventh birthday.

 

Quick to try and console his fellow Quidditch and flying fanatic after this grievous loss, Ron went on to say “Don’t worry, mate. The match was postponed until after the Christmas holidays, so we can work something out before the season starts up again. I heard that Malfoy lost his broom too, so there’s that too, I suppose...” Ron trailed off uncertainly, coming from such a background where losing something so precious and expensive was akin to losing the entire family’s primary means of transport (which he had coincidentally done).

 

Despite their shared good health and ongoing safety, a dark cloud hung over their area of the Gryffindor table.

 

Back in the Hospital Wing, a few hours after Harry had awakened, Draco’s eyes fluttered open in an entirely too graceful manner as far as Gaara was concerned, glancing over the top of his book. It hadn’t been a very good book, after all; he hadn’t even managed to read a single chapter during the night.

 

“What?” Disorientated, Draco asked groggily, as he sat up and looked about the partitioned area around his bunk and to his roommate sitting by his bedside, staring at a book.

 

As if he had only just noticed Draco waking up, Gaara put his book to one side and handed Draco some chocolate that had been sat on the bedside cabinet. Draco had only received a handful of get well baskets with the morning post since his indisposition hadn’t been widely advertised. Otherwise it would have been expected that most of the families in Slytherin would have sent at least a letter to him or his parents expressing their best wishes.

 

“Thank you.” Draco sat up in the bed and began eating the offered chocolate, feeling a pleasant, exaggerated warmth chase away what he would later understand was the lasting effects of the Dementors still clinging to him. Looking to the curtains and hearing Madame Pomfrey walking around behind them, Draco asked, “Were you here all night?”

 

Gaara shook his head.

 

Draco slowly nodded, understanding, as it would have been strange for Gaara to do something like waiting by someone’s bedside. “What happened yesterday? I remember the match in that storm, and I saw you, and then I was chasing the Snitch and I was beating Potter to it...”

 

Gaara sighed, considering using his sand clone to fill in the blanks, but such a waste of chakra was directly contrary to what little training he had received in his life. His sand zipped out and began spelling out words, the letters forming instinctively now with the practice Gaara had gained over the past few months.

 

‘Dementors attacked the game. You fell and Dumbledore caught you. Dementors sent away.’ That was all that Gaara could think to report about the affair.

 

“Dumbledore caught me? That incompetent managed to perform a proper spell? I didn’t think he still had it in him.” Despite his bluster, Draco’s shock at having almost fallen to his death was written all over his face. Most of what Draco could tell a person was usually on his face, not in his voice.

 

The curtains were pulled wide open and Poppy Pomfrey was there with her trolley at the ready. “Good morning Mister Malfoy, Mister Gaara. I see you’ve already been given some chocolate; good, that will help with the Dementor effects still holding on. I think a pepper-up potion should do and you’ll be good to go.” She looked over her cart to find the proper vial. “I trust you slept well last night, Gaara.”

 

Draco looked at Gaara but the red head gave no sign of giving any sort of response to the odd question.

 

And then Draco sat up straighter in the bed and tried to angle his head so that he could look down his nose a little at the healer still busily sorting through her cart for the correct potion. “Madame, I expect a full battery of diagnostic spells after you find the potion. I won’t risk any lasting damage from the travesty yesterday because of an oversight.” He drank the potion the old woman gave him without a second thought and waited expectantly as she began to push her trolley away.

 

“Oh, Gaara, if you feel faint or ill, please do come to see me.”

 

Gaara stood, ignoring Draco’s irate ravings about lazy medical witches, and pulled the hypochondriac blond wizard to his feet as well. Gaara had to drag his friend out of the medical wing before he could demand any other unnecessary medical spells or superfluous potions.

 

Ignoring the spoiled boy’s further insistence that he should spend the rest of the day on bed rest, Gaara dragged him to their room so that Draco could get changed and then off to lessons. He wouldn’t give Draco license to slack off because of injuries.

 

Though, of course, he would never tell Draco or anybody in this world how bad he had been after the first time he had gotten hurt. In the aftermath of the Chunin exam finals and his clash with the Konoha ninja, he had refused to walk for days, using his sand to carry him everywhere. Still, the fact remained that he knew the signs of melodrama when it came to recovery.

 

As he was changing in their room, casting aside his Quidditch robes for his school finery, he looked around, “Gaara, have you seen my broom anywhere? I don’t suppose anyone handed it in?”

 

Gaara hadn’t even thought about the broom, he shook his head.

 

Draco breathed out slowly, “It probably flew into the forest. I’ll have to talk to that ridiculous oaf of a Professor to look for it in the grounds. I wouldn’t expect them to find it now if it hasn’t already been turned in. Wouldn’t be surprised if one of those Weasleys took it to sell for food. I’ll have father buy me a new one next term, I suppose.”

 

Draco was relieved, after having changed and been dragged out of their shared room, to discover that their next scheduled lesson was History of Magic, so he would be able to get some sleep anyway.

 

With the amount of lessons they missed and the amount of slacking they did, it was a wonder that the majority of Hogwarts students made it to graduation.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Gaara looked around him, verifying that he _had_ walked into the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom like he had intended and hadn’t somehow been magically redirected to the Potions laboratory he was no longer allowed to enter. By every sign, he _should_ have been in DADA, which begged the question: ‘Why is Snape standing at the front?’

 

The pupils had entered their class as normal, excluding the absence of Lupin ushering them in with kind greetings, and had taken their seats. The chatter had steadily risen without an adult to stop it until everyone in the class, except Gaara, was loudly conversing amongst their friendship groups. A lot of it was speculation as to why Professor Lupin, who was usually pretty dependable, was late. Before Hermione Granger had had a chance to tell anyone off for distracting her from precious independent study time or suggest that someone go inform a teacher that they were unsupervised, the door slammed open in a damningly familiar way.

 

The teens all swivelled around at the loud interruption and paled collectively when they saw who was striding through the room with an especially prominent scowl on his face. Gaara and Harry Potter took a few moments longer than everybody else to process who had just entered the room, though Harry was also still reeling from the news that the red-haired psycho who had saved his life had reappeared in class with a disgruntled Malfoy in tow.

 

Snape swivelled around to face them all once he’d reached the front of the aisle and wasted no time, “Sit down. Take your books out and puts your wands away, there will be no ridiculous attempts at magic in this classroom today. Turn to page four hundred and ninety-four.”

 

Hermione piped up once she had confirmed what she was being asked to work on, and informed the professor that they hadn’t reached that chapter yet. She was promptly and rudely told to be quiet and to get on with reading about werewolves. Gaara thought that it was an uncanny similarity to his own condition; though, what he’d give to turn into a ferocious, snarling, magical wolf instead of a small, demonic and plush tanuki...

 

Snape, with no other reasonable options available, made every effort to totally ignore Gaara’s presence in his class. He refused to make eye contact and gave everyone but him a hand-out; but since the only other option was the unreasonable one whereby Snape attempted to exorcise the castle of the monstrous infestation, Gaara thought he could suffer through being ignored if it meant no further antagonism. He shared Draco’s hand-out and he was never one for asking questions in the middle of teaching so he wasn’t entirely put out by the behaviour.

 

The level of dark magic creature they were being taught about was somewhat refreshing too, since the pixies they had been taught about, while somehow terrifying to the rest of the students, were astoundingly underwhelming to the veteran.

 

While Gaara was suffering under the unprofessional conduct of one of his previous targets (one of the few that had actually survived his wrath), Lupin was out on yet another of his charitable visits to the less fortunate and less washed. It was about time someone impressed upon Sirius the full seriousness and severity of his stupidity.

 

The man, wanted by the entire world for murder and colluding with Voldemort, who had snuck into a school full of children and hosting the boy who was supposed to be his prime target, had then snuck back onto the grounds to watch a Quidditch match! In doing so, Sirius had attracted every Dementor circling the school and had started a mass attack on the student body.

 

The man wasn’t even a student anymore and he was still causing riots!

 

As he strode through the tunnel to the Shrieking Shack he clutched his cloak tighter around his skinny frame and tried to temper his indignation with the knowledge that this chill was hitting Sirius the hardest of all.

 

...Although... Gaara came from a desert and was making a good case for students to be allowed to perform warming spells in between classes, contravening that rule against magic in the hallways.

 

He made his way through the rickety old house and up the stairs and sat on the mouldy bed across from Padfoot’s lazing form on the floor. He wasn’t here for congenialities so he would dispense with the customary belly rub or ear scratch and move straight onto chewing out the irresponsible thirty-something year old.

 

How old where they, again?

 

Shaking his head, he tried to imagine the face Severus would use in a situation like this and mimicked it as best he could manage with his inexperienced, congenial face. The result managed to get Sirius’ ears to flatten atop his head, so it was a good start.

 

While Sirius was being forced through a lecture, the likes of which he hadn’t experienced since he’d announced to his mother and father that he didn’t want to go muggle hunting anymore, Gaara was being put through a similar but wholly more subtle torture. It only occurred to Lupin later on that he’d failed to warn Gaara of his absence and the solitary free replacement he’d found to fill in.

 

Remus wondered to himself whether he had withheld their incoming encounter in some sort of unconscious effort to force the two obstinate males to reconcile their differences or at the very least stop attacking one another. Alternatively, if they had to fight each other, where better to do it than in a Defence class where the battle could be billed as a demonstration. He would have to be sure to get Draco Malfoy or one of the other students to fill him in on proceedings. Unfortunately, he couldn’t trust Harry to remain one-hundred percent objective when it came to Gaara, or Snape, so he couldn’t reliably be called upon as a witness.

 

He wondered if, now that Gaara had saved Harry’s life, they might become friends, or something approaching that sentiment? Probably not...

 

...Teenagers...

 

Still, all these thoughts of manipulating ceasefires between his acquaintances made him consider whether or not he could manufacture some form of amicability between his friends and his friend’s surviving son.

 

Gaara hadn’t suffered as much that lesson as he had predicted he would by the end. In fact, barring the childish cold shoulder from Professor Snape, Gaara had been fascinated by the topic of the day: Werewolves. The lunar cycle so reminiscent of his own troubles, but the lack of a small tanuki bite proved that he didn’t have some similar malady. Still, it was worth looking into, this ‘lycanthropy,’ if he was to understand his affliction. And it would be nice to take a break from his fruitless research into getting home. Looking into werewolves and animagi would be interesting, and perhaps also useful in the meantime. He might have to ask Sirius about the whole animagus thing when they next met.

 

The sigh of relief that spread forth from the collective students when Snape and Gaara hadn’t broken out into a full-blown battle at the end of the period was promptly sucked back in when they heard the length of the essay he assigned them to complete by next week. It would seem that the red-head would be one of only two students in the lesson planning to take any sort of initiative in undertaking the essay.

 

Lupin returned to the castle feeling altogether more upbeat, having relayed his conversation with Harry to Sirius before then telling Sirius what Gaara had promised to do him if he tried sneaking back into the castle again. Testament to his godfatherly devotion, Sirius had almost still held a fond smile through Lupin’s describing Gaara’s threats.

 

The next week, Lupin was back at the front of his classroom, standing next to his blackboard and looking as unhealthy as ever. No one had trouble believing that the man had needed a day’s bed rest the week before.

 

Remus had been relieved to hear that a fight hadn’t broken out in his absence, though Snape had not made the lesson entirely painless. He figured they were even now, for the Inspector’s visit and Snape’s total non-involvement.

 

His first order of business was to cancel the ongoing essay set by Snape, trusting that only a small portion of his pupils would have attempted writing the monstrous writing task before the end of the week, and the last minute. He noted that Hermione had brought along a sizable piece of work that now sat forlornly on the edge of her desk, crying out for extra credit. And he also saw that directly following his dismissal of the task, Gaara had tucked a similar sheaf of parchment back into his satchel as well.

 

With a sigh he resigned himself to marking these two essays anyway, despite their highly personal nature to him and the off-putting length. He’d have to wrestle it off of Gaara first, since the boy would undoubtedly misunderstand his attempt at benevolence.

 

The truly remarkable occurrence happened after the lesson had ended and Lupin had told Gaara that he’d see him later. Harry had stayed behind, without even his usual entourage, to talk with the aged professor. The scrawny boy wanted to discuss his unusual susceptibility to the effects of the Dementors. Lupin tried to explain to the teen the dreadful nature of Dementors, and the reason for Harry being vulnerable because of the horrors in his past, although Lupin didn’t like to dwell on the horrors that Harry had assuredly experienced in his relatively short life. Regrets.

 

In his newly developed Teaching Mode, Remus had mentioned the means to defend oneself from Dementors and their terrible effects, and Harry had immediately begged to be taught the Patronus charm. Despite its difficulty, what else was Lupin to do but agree to tutor Harry, with one minor stipulation, of course. After all, he only had so much free time and he wasn’t as young as he used to be. He would teach Harry how to defend himself against Dementors, even work in some anecdotes about his school years with Harry’s parents, but Harry would have to share the his time with Gaara. The insomniac had ultimately been Remus’ tutee first so he couldn’t just give him the shunt in favour of Harry. Not that he wanted to anyway.

 

Despite Harry’s obvious apprehension at spending time with Gaara outside of lessons, he appeared quite anxious to begin learning the advanced spell nonetheless.

 

Remus saw it as the perfect opportunity to get the two moody teenagers to bond, which would save them a boatload of grief in the long run once they got Sirius exonerated and both Gaara and Harry ended up living with him. Lupin would, in the interests of the children, drop in regularly to check up on things. Sirius was no better than a teenager himself, and Gaara could be oblivious about the strangest things, and Harry sadly did not appear to have inherited his mother’s level head if the tales floating around the school were true.

 

Remus took a moment to sigh as he came to the realisation that he would soon be the guardian of three children with no common sense between them.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Spirits were high nearing the end of term, the boisterous students collectively forgetting the horrors that had assailed the school from within and out since September. Classes would end next Friday and everyone* was in high spirits, ready for the Christmas holidays.

 

(*Angst-ridden tanuki hosts, moody teenagers, and orphans targeted by multiple mass-murderers not included.)

 

In addition to the pre-Christmas cheer, Hogsmeade was once again playing host to droves of chattering teens. The teacher-to-student ratio had also noticeably shifted after the Dementor attack and renewed fears of Sirius Black striking, so now the students would be constantly supervised around the village. That was the plan anyway, but Lupin had prophetically told his old Head of House that not even she could keep track of that many budding mischief makers out in the wild.

 

Gaara didn’t even bother to show up as the third-years and above set off towards the village. More conspicuous was Harry’s absence, for a number of Gryffindors and a few Slytherins who were missing the target of their ridicule. Draco was glad Potter had avoided showing up as he was still susceptible to making the same old crude jokes about ‘poor orphan Potter’ when he was disallowed from travelling to the village. Even if Gaara wasn’t there, he still didn’t want to be forced to make such an insensitive remark about dead parents when Gaara was also an orphan. Probably.

 

Plus, with Gaara being as unnaturally quiet as he was, Draco often had to look over his shoulder to be certain Gaara wasn’t standing next to him, so it was never a good idea to say something that might upset his friend when there was always the chance he was somewhere within earshot.

 

The students were guided out through the covered wooden bridge to take the snowy path to Hogsmeade. Meanwhile, two of Hogwarts’ most infamous current sons were making their own ways to the sleepy little wizarding village. This time, Gaara hadn’t bothered trying to go out through the proper means and instead was walking out towards the Forbidden Forrest. He was using his time efficiently because not only was he going to Hogsmeade, but he was also going to work out some of his misplaced aggression on any Dementors he happened across. They had hurt his best friend (and scores of others), so he was looking forward to slaughtering a few. Plus is it was the only thing he did in this world that went any way towards satisfying his obnoxiously loud, demonic tenant.

 

At the same time, a much less invulnerable Harry was sneaking out behind his classmates under his father’s Cloak of Invisibility. That was the plan, anyway, but he hadn’t accounted for his footsteps showing up in the snow or a pair of notorious pranksters recognising the signs of his incognito travel. Whilst it seemed Death could not find one under the Cloak of Invisibility, the Weasley Twins had no such trouble and they dragged their invisible friend into a secluded area.

 

The pair presented Harry with the Marauder’s Map with instructions on its usage and a promise that he would use it to cause as much mayhem as he could manage. They trusted that he would live up to it since he had already broken so many rules in his short academic career. They were so proud that their brother had fallen in with someone so mischievous and that their meddlesome mother even encouraged it.

 

There was one more piece of information Harry asked for them to impart unto him, after he activated the map for the first time. He scanned over the entire sheaf of parchment and saw something particularly odd, besides his new ability to monitor the entire castle and its populace; footprints with Gaara’s name were walking towards the edge of the map, which was labelled as the border of the Forbidden Forrest. Gaara was walking into the Forbidden Forrest? And what was the second line in his given name, ‘Shukaku’? It wasn’t presented like a normal surname, stylistically it was different, but Harry couldn’t help but ask his seniors about it.

 

“We saw that as well.” Gred said.

 

“We’re not sure what it is, either, to tell you the truth.” Forge continued.

 

“We figured it might be because he isn’t from this country. They might not name people the same way there.” Gred followed on.

 

“He’s from another country?” Harry hadn’t really given all that much thought to Gaara’s origins. Hermione had helpfully told him and Ron that there hadn’t been a transfer student at Hogwarts in over seventy years. But mysterious entrances into the school aside, Harry hadn’t thought at all on where Gaara had come from. In all honesty, he was still working under the impression that if Gaara wasn’t actively working with Sirius Black then he was at least a nefarious person all on his own.

 

Fred and George simultaneously shrugged at his question, which was fair as he couldn’t expect them to know any more about Gaara than had already circulated around the general populace.

 

“Where’s he going?” He pointed at the map but Gaara’s footprints had already walked off the edge.

 

The twins looked at one another in a shared psychic moment that most magical experts still doubted was real, and frowned, “He goes out there every once in a while. We don’t know why but he usually stays out for a couple of hours and then goes back to his dorm room. He wanders around all the time.”

 

The other twin picked up where his brother left off, “And we mean any time. We’ve stayed up late and we’ve seen him walking through the halls at all hours, and for a while he slept in the classrooms, we think.”

 

“Yeah, we think he might have had a fight with that junior Malfoy prig. We’d love to know what that was about.”

 

Harry had guessed as much. Well, Hermione had guessed as much, but Harry would have noticed it for himself sooner or later if she hadn’t pointed it out. Ron might not have. “Thank you, guys. This really will help, but can it show me a way out of the castle?”

 

The taller of the two twins, by about half a millimetre, said, “We recommend that you take the One-Eyed Witch passage. It will take you straight to Honeyduke’s cellar. Just say ‘Dissendium’ to the statue of the One-Eyed Witch on the third floor and take the path to Hogsmeade.”

 

“Make sure you take your invisibility cloak with you, though. It’s hard enough to sneak through the back of the shop-”

 

“And the place will be filled with students so they’ll be on their guard for anyone sneaking around or causing trouble.” That they had run into this problem in the past went unsaid.

 

“Thank you, again.”

 

Harry didn’t want to lose any of his precious time to be spent wandering around the surely wondrous village his friends had walked on ahead to, so he donned his invisibility cloak and climbed the various staircases to the third floor, seeking out the well-known, hideous statue.

 

He spoke the word and sped through the passageway and encountered little trouble navigating his way up through the basement and into the store. On his way out, he even took the liberty of stealing a lollipop from Neville, in his invisible state. It only took him a few minutes more to locate Hermione and Ron out by the Shrieking Shack that Ron had said he wanted to visit. Hogwarts had dozens of ghosts of its own so Harry dreaded to think what sort of entities could be inhabiting the shack to make it the most haunted house in Britain. At least when he spotted the pair of Gryffindors they were behind the fence, a good distance away from the ominous building.

 

With a vicious grin, he slowly padded up behind Ron and Hermione and, seeing that Hermione had spotted his footsteps in the snow, pounced on Ron, grabbing his shoulders and eliciting a veritable shriek from the courageous lion. Hermione gave him a sound scolding afterwards, but he knew her heart wasn’t in it, seeing as she was still giggling about Ron’s reaction as well.

 

The trio, now reunited, headed back into Hogsmeade to look around whilst ducking to avoid the gazes of several of the accompanying teachers who would undoubtedly drag Harry back to the castle and punish him for sneaking out. If it was one of stricter ones, he might also have to think up a lie about how he got out in the first place as well, and the only method he could seem to think of at the moment was walking through the Forbidden Forrest to get there. Only, Harry didn’t think his teachers would believe that he had been able to safely walk through the infamous woods on his own. Even Gaara probably couldn’t make it into the deeper areas of the forest without being in danger. And he surely couldn’t walk all the way through to Hogsmeade, especially with the dementors floating about.

 

Harry took the precaution of keeping his invisibility cloak in his hands after he had to dive under it to avoid being seen by Draco Malofy and his Slytherin hoard, who seemed to have flocked back around him. Although, before the schism that had happened, Draco always appeared to be in the centre of his groups whereas now he was walking at the edge. Gryffindors would never be privy to the internal power struggles between Slytherins but Malfoy jr. had certainly shifted in the hierarchy.  

 

It was as they were milling about that Harry quickly had to pull his invisibility cloak back on when he spotted both McGonagall and Hagrid over by the Three Broomsticks pub, along with what looked like the Minister for Magic. He didn’t imagine that this pub had any particularly good vintages of wine or astounding local ails so whatever the reason Fudge was there for, daytime drinking didn’t appear to be it. Although, if any politician had reason to drink, it was the incompetent wizard that had almost walked through a humongous pile of horse manure on his way to the door.

 

Curiosity overruling higher-reasoning, Harry ran into the drinking establishment after the politician and two teachers who had been beckoned in by the owner, Madam Rosemerta. He noticed that his friends had been stopped at the door but figured he would just fill them in later on, once he’d found out whatever Fudge wanted to tell the deputy headmistress.

 

In the back room, he overheard the distressing discussion between the pub landlady, Minister for Magic and his Head of House. About how Sirius Black was not only a mass murdering right-hand-man of Voldemort, but he had also betrayed his parents to Voldemort and, perhaps worst of all, was his Godfather as well.

 

For fear of alerting those in the room, he sped down the stairs and out the door as quickly as possible. He had never been this angry. He didn’t even know that he could call what he was feeling ‘anger’, because it felt so much more toxic and hot than anything he had ever encountered. It was like a physical pain in his chest that wouldn’t abate unless he hit something, or cursed someone.

 

He knew he had promised Arthur Weasley that no matter what he heard he wouldn’t seek Sirius Black out, but never in his wildest imaginings could he have foreseen what he had just heard. He wasn’t just going to find Sirius Black, he was going to hunt him down and kill him, just like Black had done to Peter Pettigrew. But after Harry was done with him, he didn’t want there to even be a finger left of him!

 

Ron and Hermione found Harry back out by the fence of Shrieking Shack, under his cloak and emitting the unmistakable sound of sobbing.

 

It was just as Harry was screaming about Sirius being a despicable, traitorous monster that Gaara and Malfoy happened upon them, having been walking around the Shack’s perimeter fence. After Draco had ditched his Slytherin associates, he’d spotted his friend near the Shack a little while ago and they’d been ‘chatting’ and walking back to the village since. He had just been about the ask how Gaara had gotten there and what he was doing, when they had seen Potter & Co., or rather they had heard someone’s anguished screams from afar and gone to look and found Potter (and others).

 

Gaara had been having quite a nice afternoon. He’d killed some stuff in the Dark Forest, he’d met with Sirius and had even managed to avoid spending the hour telling the adult child off, and then he’d met up with Draco and listened to the latest inane gossip going around Slytherin. If it hadn’t been so cold, he might have just cracked a smile. And then he’d stumbled upon Harry Potter and his burgeoning good mood had been shot to hell. There was still more than enough sadist in him to enjoy the anguished screams of a betrayed/mourning teenager, but hearing such horrible things being said about kind Sirius did nothing to improve his mood.

 

Harry had quietened down when he saw the Slytherins passing by, but it didn’t escape anybody’s notice that his glare at Gaara was returned with equal force. Gaara regularly held a stony countenance but he didn’t often glare about people for no (apparent) reason. And that Harry was making such a face as well was enough to keep Malfoy, reformed as he was, from saying anything to defuse either the situation or his oft volatile friend. The pair passed in silence and proceeded onwards to the village, intending to walk back to the school before they missed the deadline for returning and had one of the supervising teachers come looking for them.

 

Not five minutes later, once Harry had had a little a time to breath, the trio followed after.

 

The walk back to the castle was tense between Gaara and Draco. Even though Gaara rarely gave any indication of having heard what Draco had said, and of course never verbally answered, Draco still got the distinct and resounding impression that any further attempts at conversation would not be appreciated right now. And Gaara’s mood worsened still when he had to listen to Potter’s whispering as the students were all led like cattle back to the castle. With each insult and threat towards Sirius coming from Harry, Gaara eyes darkened just ever so slightly. It didn’t go unnoticed to those around him and Gaara’s usual area of exclusion had seemingly doubled. But he was still close enough to hear Harry’s half-baked ideas of what had happened twelve years ago.

 

On the way back in, no one noticed Gaara walking beside Draco when he supposedly wasn’t meant to have gone on the Hogsmeade outing in the first place, nor did they notice that two thirds of the Golden Trio seemed to be listening intently to what a blank patch of space had to say.

 

When they arrived back at the castle, Draco tried to cheer Gaara up by giving him some expensive things he’d picked up in the village’s shops, but Gaara turned them all down, and not just because of his foul mood or that he didn’t want them. The offerings reminded him of the ones that small cult that had sprung up around him when he was a child used to give him. Yashamaru had told him that they were playing a dull game and that he should ignore them. Over the years he’d killed almost all of them. He liked to avoid the survivors...

 

He made one stop when he was in the castle, leaving a note for Lupin, that their ‘shared burden’ was in desperate need of more food and blankets. After he signed it, he’d slid it under Lupin’s door and retreated to one of the abandoned (quiet) towers for some time alone. If he saw Potter again that day he might do something regrettable.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

It had taken the rest of the weekend for Gaara to get over his murderous impulses, and he had spent quite a bit of his time out in the forest trying to work them out in less homicidal ways. He’d also taken the time to play with Fluffy, which seemed to calm him down a little, not that he’d let the overgrown mutt know it.

 

Then it came to the final full moon of the winter term and he was struck by how little he’d come to care about his monthly transformations. He’d only done it a few times before and it was already no more than a nuisance to him. It was probably something to do with the balance between the inconvenience and embarrassment, and the exhilaration that came with being a tiny tanuki hybrid. And he really was nothing if not adaptable to new situations.

 

On the night, he knocked Draco out covertly as they were ascending the stairs for dinner and took him to the infirmary, claiming that his friend had fallen down the stairs and hit his head. Madam Pomfrey, despite her dislike of Draco and his hypochondriac hysterics, would never let a student out of the infirmary after a fall like that for at least the night. He left before Pomfrey insisted he stayed as well for some reason or another. He wasn’t nearly as unhealthy as his porcelain complexion might indicate, and his stunted growth was nobody’s business.

 

He still hadn’t come up with a more long-term solution to getting rid of Draco for the night, obviously, which he realised he would need to do if he was going to be rooming with Draco for the entire school year, not to mention any subsequent semesters. He had no clue how long he would be in this world for (a scary thought to start with) but he had to think ahead for however long it would be.

 

He popped into the nearest empty classroom and hunkered down with his latest book (detailing the usage of human sacrifice in historical rune forms, a rare dark tome from the restricted section) to wait for the change. He’d wait until everyone had vacated the halls before he would dart into the forest. By the time he, in his animal form, could escape the confines of the room he was sequestered in, he would be climbing the walls again. There had to be a better way.

 

It was really losing the shock factor, this whole transformation deal, with the bone shifting and snapping, hair receding and fur growing, and that god damned tail. It was all over with soon enough and then he had to wait around reading in a form that really wasn’t psychologically adapted to sitting still and reading dull magical theory books. Predictably, this was the real trial of the night and each footfall outside the classroom’s door was like a shock to the back of his neck. Not because he was afraid of discovery, he was getting pretty used to that fear by now, it was because he was acutely aware of how trapped he was feeling. It was just as well that he didn’t have his sand abilities when he was transformed as he would probably have busted down a wall or two by now.

 

When he was sure there were no more stragglers milling around the corridors, he moved his clothes and gourd so that any curious trespassers wouldn’t spot his possessions from a glance into the room. The last thing he needed was to find himself transformed back and exposed, hunting down whoever had stolen his clothes. He ran through the empty hallways, all four paws patting against the stone floors, with the nearest exit being the only thing on his mind. He might have run past a ghost at some point but he couldn’t be sure, and he wasn’t interested in turning back to check. He wanted out.

 

As soon as he hit the grass outside, he stopped his four-legged run and stood up on his back digitigrade legs to enjoy the night air. His human form was used to desert sun and heat, his animal form had cosy fur so the Scottish winter no longer bothered him as totally. It was as he was ambling towards the tree line that he heard running coming towards him. Turning, he saw...

 

Who else...? Luna Lovegood. Somehow, that girl _would_ find him like this. Unbeknownst to him, and everybody else, Luna had been staying up every few nights and waiting by the edge of the Forbidden Forest in order to catch sight of the fluffy thing she had seen and chased in months gone by. She may not have been able to find definitive proof of Crumple-Horned Snorkacks (yet), but this creature had appeared before her and now she just had to capture it and document it. It also helped that it was too adorable to let alone. She had theorised that it was perhaps some form of magical red panda, though it wasn’t red... or maybe a giant squirrel, with a humongous bushy tail.

 

Sadly, wild animal that it was, it didn’t stick around when it saw her approaching slowly and darted into the forest at such a speed that she had no hope of catching up to it. As she lost sight of it, she called out, “It’s okay, you know. I don’t mean you any harm. I just want to keep you as a pet. I’ll take good care of you.”

 

If she shouted any more, Gaara didn’t hear it as he sprinted deeper into the (relative) safety of the woods. Gaara honestly didn’t know whether Luna would have been as embarrassed as any normal person if she were to find out his human identity, having said all of that. Strange girl.

 

The night was spent much the same as the first time he had found himself in this form roaming through the forest at night, though this time it was without the Hagrid chase and awkward learning to run parts. A word came to mind that would never pass his mind or find itself written in his sand in a million years: frolicking. There was a certain elation inherent in this basal form whenever he simply ran or jumped. It was entirely disconcerting, but as long as he didn’t find it encroaching upon his rational human mind, he would let it runs its course during the one night a month that he spent transformed.

 

He made it back to the forest’s edge in good time, but not before hearing a bone chilling wolf’s howl out in the distance. As often as he frequented the forest, he knew there was still a lot of stuff he had yet to see. He recovered his personal effects without any further incidents, and changed back into his uniform promptly once he’d gone through the uncomfortable transformation. He made his way down to the dormitory to get a new change of clothes and wash up before he would go up and check on Draco. More for appearance than any true concern as he knew how to safely render a person unconscious, starkly contrasted to his knowledge of _unsafely_ incapacitating a person. Plus, he did feel a little guilty about his continued abuse of his friend and roommate.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Pulling Draco out of the medical wing had been easier said than done when his friend was entirely convinced that a fall down the stone steps of Hogwarts warranted a proper battery of tests and wouldn’t leave without them. Granted, if had actually fallen down stairs that might have held true, but Madam Pomfrey was nothing if not thorough and was willing and eager to kick Draco out, so that meant she knew Draco was fine. Or he was so annoying that she was willing to take the risk. Either way, it was time for breakfast and Gaara’s excited running all through the night had left him uncharacteristically hungry.

 

As they eached chomped on toast and eggs, Draco spied McGonagall moving from student to student, canvassing the pupils for who was staying for Christmas and who was returning home for the holidays. The blond decided it was finally time to ask whether Gaara would stay with his family over the break. He’d long since messaged his parents, telling them that Gaara would be coming back with him. He’d told them that weeks ago sure in the knowledge that he could lie and tell them something to get Gaara of the hook last minute. Like he had come down with some dreadful illness that shouldn’t be spread, or he wasn’t allowed to stay with them because Dumbledore said so and was probably trying to keep Gaara away from pureblood (Dark) influences. If his sociopath friend said no, he would come up with something.

 

“Gaara,” he said, waiting for Gaara to put down his toast, “I know you don’t have anywhere to go over the holidays; my parents have asked me to invite you to stay with us, rather than remaining here. I can tell them no, if you’d rather not.”

 

It was disheartening to see how unconvinced Gaara was at the prospect of staying with his family for a few weeks, taking more than a few moments to visibly process the offer. But then, Gaara probably didn’t quite understand what he was offering, as his friend was undeniably strange in all things. He gave mention of the annual Malfoy Yuletide Ball, of the superb food and accommodations at the manor, and about the grounds. Still Gaara looked unconvinced so he gave thought to what his roommate seemed to enjoy (other than vigorous exercise and warm climates) and then mentioned the extensive Malfoy family library, home to quite a number of rare books that even Hogwarts didn’t possess. He knew he wouldn’t insult Gaara sensibilities by dropping in that his family’s collection also boasted a world class selection of Dark magic research materials. He’d often seen Gaara with a suspiciously Dark looking tome perched on his knees, though he knew better than to ask whether he’d been sneaking into the restricted section.

 

Yes, for someone as atrociously ungifted in practical magic as Gaara, he was a diligent theorist and fast becoming one of the most knowledgeable non-Raveclaws (except Granger) in their year. And with his penchant for obscure and unusual research projects (secretly all in effort to get home), Gaara was definitely going to find some interesting reading material in their library. Personally, it wasn’t his thing to wile away the day reading dusty old books, but each to their own. And by the widening of Gaara’s eyes, he guessed (hoped?) his compatriot was reconsidering. When they got there, he would make sure the red-head didn’t spend all his time sitting still and being boring.

 

Gaara gave more thought to the offer and continued eating his breakfast, ignoring Draco’s expectant gaze until McGonagall was asking after the Slytherin winter plans and came to them. Draco of course replied that he was returning home but both he and McGonagall were shocked when Gaara sand rose and spelt out ‘I’m going with him.’

 

Minerva was shocked that the unnerving transfer student/found magical child wanted to stay with the Malfoy family over Christmas, and tried to reason that they would need the Malfoy’s permission to allow it. Draco readily supplied a letter to that effect, apparently having been waiting to hand it over all throughout the breakfast. Still unsure, she noted them both down on her form, and continued her rounds until she could chat with Dumbledore about his plans concerning the boy. They could always try to block Gaara by demanding parental consent if they needed to, but if the sightings of Gaara in Hogsmeade were true, it probably wouldn’t actually stop him from leaving.

 

Albus always had plans when it came to potential dangers and Gaara was certainly something along those lines, having attacked a teacher already and gotten into a fight with Harry Potter. Then there was the boggart killing incident and the rumours of trespassing and slaying dementors. Albus was doing something with Gaara, but he hadn’t seen fit to tell her about it.

 

Draco was immensely happy that his friend would be coming for the extended sleepover, even if they did cohabitate the same room on a daily basis, and even if his parents would formalise half the fun out of it. Gaara, of course, didn’t show it but he chose to believe that the stoic foreigner was also glad to be staying with him.

 

Gaara was still hungry. Who had the bacon?

 

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Omake: 

Fluffy liked Gaara. He liked Hagrid too, Hagrid was nice and gave him food. Gaara gave him food too. Gaara felt like home. Fluffy wished for a scant few things: he wanted more treats and food, somewhere to get out of the rain, for his head on the far right to stop fighting with his centre head, and for Gaara to visit more often.

 

He sometimes smelled Gaara in the forest even when Gaara hadn’t come to see him. He always chased after the scent.

 

He was hungry.

 

He was a little cold...

 

Squirrel!

 

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Omake #2:

 

The sun was going to rise soon; it was still strange to be watching the blackened sky brightening from inside of the castle. He hadn’t gotten to sleep the night he stayed in the Great Hall and after the lights had gone out and the clouds had hidden the moonlight from the land, reading his book had become a strain. His game of watching the students trying in vain to stay up with him had ended with final hold out at about three in the morning, by his estimates. He was just about to try meditating when he heard a subtle shifting of pyjamas and soft footfalls of a civilian trying to sneak around.

 

Opening his eyes, Gaara spotted two dark figures moving unmistakably towards him, and only their size (being indicative of their young age) kept him from sitting up and pre-empting another sneak attack like the one he’d received the first night he’d spent in the castle.

 

When they were a few metres away, the clouds moved and the two incomers were revealed to be those two fifth-year Weasley twins. Of what he knew of them, he reconsidered whether these two might be more of a threat than whoever had attacked him. Pranksters were more trouble than anyone gave them credit for. A particularly unpredictable prankster had been one of the reasons the Suna-Konoha war had ended so swiftly.

 

They were upon him and began whispering in that infuriating tanden, “Morning, Gaara.”

 

“My brother-”

 

“And I wanted to present you with a proposition. We want to enter into a joint venture with you, namely pranking the whole school.”

 

“We’ve seen what you can do and heard some interesting things otherwise, and-”

 

“Think you would be perfect to aid us.”

 

“On a one-off basis.”

 

“We thought about targeting you.”

 

“Well, he did.” One pointed to the other, earning a scowl.

 

“But you seem like the type of person who might take that sort of thing personally.”

 

“The vengeful sort, you know.”

 

“So, we decided you’d be perfect to join us in a big one.” Their whispers trailed off as Gaara continued to stare unblinkingly at them from his reclined position.

 

Without any movement more profound than a blink, his sand rose into the air between them and spelled out his refusal of their offer of partnership, and instead told them of ‘a certain blond friend’ of his and a few of the legendary pranks he had pulled. George and Fred privately wondered whether there was a side to Draco Malfoy that no one knew about.

 

At the end of Gaara’s silent storytelling, he ended it with these words: ‘You were both right, by the way. I am vengeful.’ All spelled out with that same wide-eyed stare on Gaara’s otherwise totally blank face.

 

As the twins scampered off quickly, he smiled to himself as he’d ensured that he wouldn’t be the target of their fun any time soon, and had managed to inspire them with a few of his veteran prankster friend’s classic shenanigans.

 


	8. Chapter 8

“Just how many are there?”

 

“Almost a thousand, all in all. That should suffice for now.”

 

Lucius was gobsmacked, “A thousand!? How have you kept this a secret from the Wizengamot for so long? When did this start?”

 

Fudge was strangely calm, not turning any shade resembling his traditional puce or stuttering out excuses, in fact he looked almost like a respectable politician as he addressed Lucius. “I had to keep this a secret from everyone, otherwise Black might have captured someone and gotten the information through torture. We couldn’t allow these plans to spread to him before everything was in place.”

 

Lucius didn’t know what to say to that; such an obvious lie that meant that he wasn’t amongst Fudge’s trusted confidantes at the moment, but why? And why breed nearly a thousand new dementors in the first place? That was almost equal to the total number posted at Azkaban prison.

 

“We don’t know how, but the dementors posted at Hogwarts are being destroyed and Sirius Black has slipped into the castle and escaped again already.”

 

What went unsaid was that Fudge could have instead sent Aurors to the school, but instead had decided to post dementors. It was almost as if... as if someone else was pulling Fudge’s strings right now. It wasn’t Albus Dumbledore; that was for sure, since neither he nor the headmaster wanted to see such a disproportionate lockdown of the school. Not when the monsters had already attacked the students (his son) once already. He wracked his brain to figure out who had the sway and the inclination to make such a clandestine power grab, and the only name that he could think of was that one man he tried to avoid, who was something of a mystery to everyone: Henrick Morbidus. Fudge’s left hand, and one of the few people other than Voldemort that might consider stationing a thousand ravenous dementors around a school to be a good idea.

 

“With all due respect, Minister, but surely you can’t seriously be considering this! It’s lunacy. There’s simply no way to control that many dementors, especially in such an environment. You’d need twice the handlers at Azkaban to keep them in line.”

 

“Lucius, it will be fine. I’ve had two dozen extra wranglers trained and certified and they’ll be sent to Hogwarts with the new dementor corp.” Fudge was starting to turn that familiar shade of red now, his patience with Lucius questioning his decisions wearing thin.

 

“Twenty-four, on top of what, ten at Hogwarts already? Cornelius, sir, I must insist that you delay-”

 

“No, I will not delay!”

 

Lucius took a small step back and turned his eyes to the dossier that Fudge had presented to him at the start of this sickening meeting. Behind the confusing or ambiguous language, the report claimed that the program had begun just a few days after Morbidus had performed his inspection of the school. This had been going on for over a month, Fudge was listening to that sociopath Morbidus and now this insane plan was afoot; something had Cornelius Fudge spooked like nothing ever had before.

 

Lucius looked up from the file with his perfect calm restored and snapped the sheaf of paper shut. “I will notify the relevant authorities of this plan, as well as the rest of the board of Hogwarts’ governors. I am afraid I have to depart, by your leave, of course.”

 

Fudge slumped into his high-backed leather chair and glanced up, “Yes, yes, by all means.”

 

“I am to collect my son from the train station. He’s back for the holidays.”

 

Fudge, who had taken to ignoring Lucius’ presence in his office, turned up sharply at what the platinum blond had intended to be small-talk. “Your son is friends with that curious transfer student that has had everyone abuzz. Is he visiting with you over the break too?”

 

The current head of the Malfoy family hesitated a second, but he couldn’t formulate a reasonable lie that he would be able to worm his way out of later if it was discovered that Gaara had indeed stayed with them. “Yes, Draco did ask if his roommate could stay with us for the holidays. Poor thing, no family or friends. The Malfoy family believes in helping those less fortunate souls, if they’re the proper sort.”

 

“Yes, quite right,” Fudge said, again unfocussed and largely ignoring Lucius again.

 

Lucius wished the Minister of Magic a good night and backed out of the office, making quick work of sending those damning memos to the separate departments as soon as he reached his own office. If he sent them off now, before he left for the weekend, those other department heads would still have time to read them before they too left for the night. This way, those departments could sort out whatever problems they thought up themselves and not bother him about them when he got back in on Monday. It would likely ruin their weekends but it would make his next week so much easier.

 

As soon as he’d sent off his last paper airplane memo, he walked into his private fireplace and floo’ed straight to Platform 9¾ to meet his wife and wait for the Hogwarts Express to arrive. Narcissa was already waiting and looked to be in high spirits, if her posture and tightened eyebrows were any indication. Even for him, it was still a challenge to tell what his wife was thinking when they were out and amongst people, she had that natural sort of stoicism that went beyond what was ingrained through years of harsh training in an aristocratic family. Sadly, neither he nor Draco could come close to her level of mastery in veiling their emotions, both males having been raised in considerably kinder households (by comparison).

 

She greeted him with all of the cold deportment he expected and returned the words in kind before settling beside her and taking comfort in her calming presence. They still had another hour or so before the Hogwarts Express would arrive, the train having run behind schedule since before his father had first ridden it.

 

Other parents began to arrive and stand about along the platform, making the place look untidy. They chatted and strolled and paced, making a racket for both the ears and eyes. He would be glad to collect the boys and return to the manor and relax, once he had sent the visitor off to bed, of course. It wouldn’t do to allow a guest in his home to see him acting casually, that was best left to times of solitude or with one’s wife and family.

 

This riffraff surrounding him simply lacked the fortitude to conduct themselves with the proper dignity demanded of a man of his standing. At least his wife understood.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Cornelius Fudge let a breath escape his lips after Lucius had left his office, and he flicked his wand to lock his office door post-haste. He needed a few minutes to calm down after he had been forced to evade his closest political ally’s questions. If Lucius could only know what he knew about that Gaara child...

 

That child, whom he had never met, had become his biggest concern in a matter of months, eclipsing even the escaped, convicted mass-murderer on the loose. Sirius Black was a mere trifle at the moment, someone to be on the lookout for and nothing more.

 

Cornelius, despite what many other might say, was not one to buy into public hysteria or frenzy easily, and he wasn’t about to act upon a mysteriously appeared magical child, even one with a particularly unsettling demeanour, nor was he about to send out the forces over a few killed dementors. That action did, however, warrant him sending his trusted worker and recent confidante, Morbidus to investigate, but that didn’t turn up much except the probable guilt of the child. He would have sent an auror or perhaps sent Morbidus back to talk to the boy, possibly arrest him, if not for what his routine enquiry had turned up.

 

When Morbidus had been hunting the boy in the castle, fruitlessly for the most part, countless false leads also gave way to dozens of fictional anecdotes of improbable feats that Gaara was supposed to have performed. Henrick had painstakingly assessed each of them, Cornelius had a list on his desk. But there was one story that a classmates of Gaara’s had mentioned, almost in passing. Hogwarts resident soothsayer and Divinations professor was widely believed to be a joke, no true prophecies ever having been confirmed to her and no evidence of any actual ability having explained why Albus had so steadfastly defended her employment there. Until now.

 

The child had told Morbidus that in Gaara’s first Divinations lesson, Sybil Trelawney had given a startlingly off-putting ‘prophecy’ about Gaara, which very few in their year group, let alone in the school at large, believed. The child couldn’t remember the exact wording, but that had set Morbidus in motion to send a request to the Department of Mysteries for the exact prophecy. Of course, he had never expected anything to come of it, just as with his owls to the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures requesting they ask the Vampire colonies if one of their young had wandered off.

 

The Department of Mysteries had strict guidelines in place for such enquiries and even his position as Minister of Magic only allowed him to listen to prophecy if he was able to give certain pertinent details about it. He couldn’t have just guessed the names and seen who had a prophecy regarding them. What he heard that dark night had chilled him to the bone.

 

‘ _He, who is part of ten, killer of a hundred killers, will destroy the foundation, and overwhelm death itself! The seven bonded will die, for the final moments will reveal the darkness hidden unless evil overcomes evil and good prevails… He will return!_ ’

 

Admittedly, he hadn’t heard a lot of prophecies, but Fudge had not slept that night as he worked over in his head what it could all mean, and why it was directed at this unimportant, dementor-killer. Most of it was too ambiguous to tell, but the part that had Fudge ordering the creation of unconscionable dementor numbers was the mention of destroying ‘the centre.’

 

There was only one centre to Wizarding Britain and it was the Ministry of Magic.

 

Needless to say, Gaara had him scared, and with Lucius’ son being a close friend and roommate to the boy, and Lucius himself inviting Gaara to the Malfoy estate over Christmas, he could not lean on the man in this matter. It was only Cornelius’ good fortune that he had Henrick there to aid him in this most dire of hours.

 

Gaara was a serious danger, perhaps even the next budding Dark Lord now that Voldemort had been defeated, and Fudge would do what was necessary to stop him whilst he still could.

 

The dementors were simply the first step.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Gaara had gone to see Sirius shortly before leaving for the train; he wanted to make sure that Sirius would survive the few weeks he would be away at the Malfoy’s, which he was told was in the south of the country, apparently several hundred miles away. It hadn’t seemed that far between London and Scotland in the train, but Draco said that was part of the magic.

 

He brought Sirius a large sack stuffed full of preserved foods and told him not to do anything stupid while he was gone, or else he would gladly run the full five-hundred miles to come and kill him. Sirius hugged him and wished him a happy Christmas, as well as thanking him for the food.

 

The red-head had then taken the time to drop in on Lupin to say goodbye, though it was more to tell him to keep an eye on their wayward mutt of a friend lest he does something else reprehensible. Neither would put it past the less than venerable head of   the Black family to try to sneak in again over the break.

 

They chatted a little, and Lupin asked, out of curiosity, whether Gaara knew what Christmas was.

 

He did not.

 

Apparently the foreigner had no understanding of the holiday whatsoever except that it was a winter holiday and it necessitated taking time off of school and work. Lupin honestly would have liked to explain it to the oblivious boy, but time was running short and Gaara was going to be late for his train if he didn’t hurry.

 

Unfortunately for Gaara, this meeting also ended with uncomfortable bodily contact in the form of a hug before he could get away. Apparently this _Christmas_ thing made the people of this world unnaturally sentimental and prone to displays of emotion and affection. He would have to be wary of that in the coming days, though if his guesses were correct, that wouldn’t be too much of a danger in the Malfoy home. Lupin also told him to write to him over the break if he got the chance, as Gaara was speedily walking out of the door.

 

He passed straight through the hubbub of the common room, where the majority of Slytherins were preparing to go home for the holidays, and met Draco in their room where the prissy blond was finishing packing his enlarged trunk. Apparently the spoilt boy had had trouble closing the thing, so packed full of unnecessary items that he wanted to cart back and forth between school and home. Gaara had finished his packing last night and he truthfully didn’t have all that much to pack in the first place. He really only had a few sets of schools robes, his own original clothes, his ninja pouch, a fair few books, some school equipment, and his gourd. That wasn’t to say that he wanted for anything. A few books and some clean clothes, he was easy to please.

 

Of course, a little violence now and then didn’t go amiss, but he was trying to cut back.

 

He had said something along the lines of minimalism and not overvaluing material possessions to Draco a while ago and he might as well have said he’d fallen in love with him with the face that Draco made. Worse yet, Draco then tried to instil a healthy sense of materialism in him by describing all the wonderful things one could buy with money and all the things he himself owned. Saddest part was, _that_ was Draco being selfless.

 

Instead of watching Draco struggle up the many flights of stairs with his engorged trunks, so stuffed that the light-weight charms were to busting point, Gaara had his sand pick up all three of their combined trunks and follow them out of the castle. Draco was appropriately grateful and the Slytherins around them, who all had to lug their chests and trunks up from the dungeons by hand, all shot the pair fittingly jealous looks.

 

Gaara spared a moment as Draco was boarding the carriage, in order to pet the affectionate thestrals who were, when they weren’t nuzzling his tail, quite agreeable creatures. He realised that he hadn’t been to see Fluffy before he left, as he entered the carriage, but since he’d be returning early, he would just pop out and see him then. Maybe bring the rambunctious three-headed dog a dead cow or something as a treat.

 

At the station, there were a few teachers performing the last checks for those who were going, and as luck would have it, it was Severus Snape at the head of their line. It went okay, though, Snape only muttering something along the lines of ‘don’t come back’ under his breath as Gaara passed into the train carriage.

 

They weren’t exactly the first to board, so, consequently, there were no empty compartments left in the entire train. It was just by sheer chance that when Gaara and Draco entered into a compartment with a single second-year sat there, that underclassman suddenly remembered that he urgently had somewhere else to be and left them in peace. Lucky coincidence...

 

It was a pleasant silence between Draco and Gaara, with one being functionally mute by way of injury and the other being in deep rumination over the impending meeting of his parents and his best friend and role model. Both read their own books, or snacked on sweets, or watched the rural scenery passing by in a blur, or conversed in short, comfortably halting bouts. And after two hours of veritable whining by the platinum-blond, Gaara finally agreed to create another unnecessary sand-clone.

 

As Draco and the other inhabitants of this world so often were at the sight of one of his _ninjutsu_ , the repeated spectacle of his sandy double forming caused Draco to look incredibly uncomposed. The sight almost made it worth the waste of time, to see his closest friend in this world losing his tenuous grip on proper comportment. There was only room for one stony countenance in their friendship.

 

Draco, who was quite the conversationalist anyway, seemed to absolutely relish the opportunity to actually talk with Gaara. The red-head had to admit, it was much easier to communicate this way, even if it was a bit trickier controlling his sand. Spelling out letters was a mite simpler than forming faux vocal chords and having them resonate to exactly match his own voice, whilst simultaneously controlling the lips and face and body of the clone itself. Unlike traditional clone techniques, he actually controlled the sand that made the false body, rather than just using a pattern _jutsu_ to have the elements form the body on their own.

 

Of course, Draco did not and could not appreciate any of this as he was enraptured by talking about the same mundane affairs they had been talking about for the past two hours, schoolwork, Slytherin gossip, the, admittedly funny, rumours that had circulated around Gaara as well as a few other choice students (including _Potter_ ). Obviously, like always, Draco did the vast majority of the talking for the two of them, but even the rare monosyllabic responses or, rarer yet, full sentences from the normally painfully silent teen were treasured.

 

Gaara hadn’t realised before, but when he used this technique, ridiculous usage of combat techniques aside, he could practically ignore Draco and continue to read whilst the conversation was continued absent-mindedly, and the usually attention-demanding Malfoy was none the wiser as he nattered inanely to the false face looking at him. Maybe he should make more use of it in the future... Food for thought.

 

After an hour, he deactivated it and decided to take a stroll to clear his head, unused to talking so much after months of silence. He had a little bit of a headache. Plus he was bored and wanted a break from Draco’s nervous chatting.

 

Strolling down the train, he considered jumping onto the roof of the train for a while to get some fresh air, but the doors wouldn’t open and he would struggle to fit through the window with his gourd on, so he settled for walking up and down the lengthy railway train.

 

He’d felt it before, when he had made the trip up to Scotland in September, that this was a truly remarkable world that he landed in. The magic was similar to his own world’s techniques, but the inventions were several orders of magnitude ahead of most of what he had seen in the Elemental Nations. He understood that it was being sped up with magic, but the train here made a journey, that might have otherwise taken him a few days to run, in only a few hours. And then there were the legion ‘cars’ around London, and the other untold advancements that Wizards were apparently happy to ignore.

 

Draco seemed positively blasé about the train so it shouldn’t come as a surprise that wizards were uninterested in such things as cars and muggle technology when the quintessential conservative wizarding youth didn’t care. But then, with the speeds that the average wizard or witch ran at, it appeared none of them were all that bothered with the idea of going fast. Unless it was flying...

 

Gaara shuddered. They definitely still needed to work on their flying techniques.

 

Along the train Gaara mostly strolled along the length of the train looking out the outside window to watch the scenery fly by in a blur, but every time he looked into the compartments he would notice that all the occupants were conspicuously staring at him in silence, as if he were a dementor patrolling the carriages and drawing out terror in all he met; so he mostly looked out the other side. England, the train having already passed out of Scotland, was so green but didn’t have the dense forestry of Fire country. It was quite pretty, but he still couldn’t bear to hold it in comparison to his beloved sandy nation.

 

His ambling steps came to a halt as he noticed someone was standing in his path, having been walking whilst looking to his side all this way. Turning his head, he was somehow unsurprised to find Luna Lovegood stood before him with that everyday vacant smile on her face. She had popped up more times than he liked to consider coincidental recently.

 

“Hello Gaara.”

 

He returned the greeting with a nod. After all, there was no call to be rude to someone who had essentially always been courteous to him, if a tad uncouth when requesting he be her pet (as a fluffy, somewhat anthropomorphic, tanuki, granted).

 

“Are you going home for Christmas, Gaara?”

 

He shook his head.

 

“Oh,” She dropped her smile for a second, “then you must be going to stay with Draco Malfoy for the holiday. I’m going home to see my father. I miss him when I’m at school; he can see the same things I can see. I wonder why the other people Hogwarts can’t see the Nargles and Wrackspurts. But, then, you can’t see them either, can you? That’s a shame.” One trait Gaara enjoyed about when conversing with Luna was that she didn’t insist on making eye contact when talking to him. He’d never particularly liked looking people in the eyes, except maybe when he was brutally murdering them. That might be somehow related to his aversion now.

 

“Of course, when you’re staying with at the Malfoys, you might encounter some of the Heliopaths that Minister Fudge has been hiding all around Britain. If you see any there, will you tell me about them?” Luna looked at him and he couldn’t see the harm in nodding. After all, if he did indeed see some of these things, why not tell the one person in the world who would care.

 

“Oh, I forgot to say, I’m sorry about what happened with Ginny the night we all had that sleepover in the Great Hall. Apparently she was upset for some reason. I don’t think she likes you very much. Do you know why?” Luna tilted her head like an owl, wide eyes included.

 

Gaara shook his head. He had a good idea of why the youngest of the Weasley’s litter had attacked him but he didn’t feel the need to share that information.

 

“Oh well. I’m sure once she gets to know you she won’t be scared anymore.”

 

Gaara raised his eyebrow. This girl was hopelessly oblivious. Her father must worry constantly about her walking off cliffs or petting Manticores.

 

“After all, Draco and I are the only people in the whole world that know you and we like you. Everyone else just doesn’t know you yet, but I’m sure they will eventually. One day they’ll all smile when you walk down the hallway, rather than all of that cowering that they do now.”

 

Gaara appreciated the sentiment with which she was saying these optimistic but impossible things. He had paused when she mentioned the ‘whole world’ part, but it was presumably just hyperbole rather than some knowledge of his extraterrestrial origins. And although he couldn’t believe a word of what she had said, he had to admit it was funny that all four of the people he had repeatedly interacted with, Sirius, Remus, Draco and her; they had all come to be his friends. Well, the former three were; Luna was someone whom he encountered more often than might be mistaken for coincidental. But she was nice enough, wasn’t particularly annoying (when he was in human form), and seemed to enjoy his company so he supposed maybe they were indeed friends.

 

Still, his past in his home world had taught him that he was not a sociable creature. He was a monster, whether in practice or just in existence, and he couldn’t count on more than a few people overlooking his glaring defects.

 

But Luna was kind to say it.

 

Soon after that, Luna began to shift in her spot and then an idea seemed to pop into her head and she said, in a moment of clarity, “I was on the way to the bathroom. I’m afraid I’ll have to excuse myself. Have a nice Christmas, Gaara. Say hello to Draco for me. Or don’t, whichever you think he’d prefer.” She skipped past him to the end of the carriage where the toilets were located and Gaara walked onwards.

 

It seemed quite a few students were going home for the holidays. Apparently they would rather risk another attack on the train than spend the break in the castle surrounded by dementors. Plus the castle was being targeted by a mass-murderer, which Gaara often forgot. Draco had mentioned that almost everyone that had a home to go to was going there for Christmas because of the threat to the school.

 

What Draco _hadn’t_ mentioned was that Gaara was one of the reasons that the students were fleeing the school in terror. Draco was kind that way.

 

Two of the people who were going home, that Gaara subtly glanced along his path, were Ron Weasely and Hermione Granger, along with Ron’s little sister and probably Luna when she returned from the privy. He didn’t pass this compartment, but instead warily stayed back to listen in on what was being said inside. If he could steal the rat here then it would save him a lot of hassle in the long run, even if having to explain his taking of the Weasley family pet would be a pain in the short term.

 

Sadly, one of the first things discussed in the train compartment was that Hermione’s cat was a monster and that it had eaten Ron’s rat. Gaara panicked until Hermione complained that Ron had been repeatedly claiming that Crookshanks (presumably her cat) had eaten Scabbers for months and they still kept finding him. She assured him and, unbeknownst to them, Gaara, that Scabbers would be waiting for him when he got back to the school. Gaara sure hoped so.

 

They soon got over what was assuredly a rehashed gripe and moved on to lamenting that Harry had to stay in Hogwarts alone when they had been called home by their parents. Apparently Hermione had been filling her muggle parents in on the situation at school and was somehow surprised to find they didn’t want her spending any time there that she didn’t absolutely have to.

 

As he was leaving he heard them mention his name. He supposed they, like almost everyone else, talked about him behind his back at every opportunity. It would be narcissism if the student body didn’t part like the Red Sea when he walked amongst them. Ron and Hermione were discussing having met him in the Leaky Cauldron before they went to Hogwarts. He continued walking away, he didn’t need to hear gossip. That was what Draco was for.

 

He returned to his own carriage and seat after that, having seen enough of the train and its paranoid occupants to satisfy his wanderlust. Draco had apparently gone to speak to his own friends, either his old bigoted ones or the new moderate ones. Gaara was in no doubt that he preferred the latter group, or rather, since he didn’t actually like associating with either, he preferred Draco hanging around the latter group. They were a better influence and they held a healthier respect for leaving Gaara alone.

 

Draco came back and they changed out of their school uniforms shortly shortly before hitting the outskirts of London. Draco put on an expensive-looking black suit that Gaara had never seen him wear before, and Gaara put on his casual robes that he had been given along with his uniform when Remus had taken him to Diagon Alley. He had thought about putting on his own clothes, but his ninja apparel would have drawn even more attention to him, and besides that was the fact that Draco’s parents were wizarding xenophiles and would probably not appreciate him displaying his culture at their first meeting.

 

Gaara could see that Draco was incredibly tense as the train slowed to a stop and he searched out the window for his parents on the platform. Draco collected his trunk and had Gaara do the same so they could depart as soon as the train came to a stop. He said it was so they wouldn’t have to wade through the crowds but Gaara thought it was probably more to do with not keeping Draco’s father waiting.

 

Ironic that Draco’s boggart would be about as revealing as his own. Some of their classmate’s fears had been simple phobias or common aversions, but some clearly had deeper roots.

 

It turned out that almost every other student had opted to disembark quickly, to avoid the rush, and so everyone ended up shuffling around in a huddle until they had squeezed out of the train’s doors and onto Platform 9 ¾.

 

Lucius and Narcissa watched the train pull up and the rabble pour out of the side with a bored detachment until Narcissa spotted a dearly familiar shiny platinum-blond head pushing through the throngs to where they always met to pick him up. Both Narcissa and her husband noticed immediately that Draco’s companion, obviously this Gaara person they had heard so much about, had no such need to force his way through the rabble because the other children seemed to jump out of his way when they saw him.

 

He was shorter than they would have imagined, shorter than most of his classmates, in fact, but he walked confidently, though sadly without the proper bearing of a nobleman. He was dressed acceptably, if a little shabbily for meeting them, but then he _was_ a foreigner so they would have to make some small exceptions. His face was calm and almost expressionless, not even holding their family’s patented bored-contempt look. It was eerie to see such a look on a child’s face when all of his peers were running around with insipid smiles and laughing all the way. Even Draco, as much as he tried, couldn’t properly hide his thoughts from his expression. The poor child was obviously nervous.

 

Gaara and Draco approached and stopped to greet the two regal adults.

 

“Hello father, mother. This is Gaara.” Draco turned to him so Gaara bowed a little and hoped he wouldn’t accidentally offend someone. He’d always been uncomfortable in these sorts of formal situations since his father had (rightfully) gone to some lengths to keep him and his homicidal tendencies away from any visiting nobles, especially the Daimyo, when he was younger.

 

The two adults looked at him with undisguised contempt and they curtly nodded their heads to him and turned away towards the platform’s floo terminals. It seemed they had concluded their greetings, which suited Gaara perfectly. He was, in many ways, a man of few words; though it was surprising that they were so cold to their son. Maybe they actually disliked him.

 

After the adults had walked through fire, a questionable mode of travel if ever Gaara had seen one, the red-head realised that the reason he had avoided using this method of travel before was because he was unable to vocalise his destination, hence why Remus had had to drag him out of the school wards to teleport them to Diagon Alley. Apparently Draco was smarter than a venerated war veteran and professor at Hogwarts, or else he had been thinking about the problem for a while, as he devised a solution to the problem immediately.

 

Although, as Draco called out “Malfoy Manor” and grabbed Gaara’s hand, Gaara wondered if this idea had occurred to Lupin after all and the older man had simply not wanted to risk trying to hold Gaara’s hand. As it was, Draco was on thin ice.

 

They walked out of the floo into a drafty stone chamber to find Draco’s mother and father waiting for them, looking at them with all of the interest their all-too brief meeting had lacked.

 

As expected, the hall was ostentatious and dark and showed off the Malfoy family’s elegant aesthetic blaringly, but not garishly. Though it did straddle a thin line between tasteful and over the top.

 

Another thought about the interior occurred to Gaara as he approached mister and missus Malfoy, that their decorating scheme was surprisingly minimalist. He’d half expected there to be cabinets filled to the brim with cursed relics and torture equipment hanging from the ceiling.

 

What the boy from another world didn’t know was that such things had been found in abundance in the Malfoy abode until their house was raided by the Ministry a little while ago and the patriarch was forced to dispose of their wealth of obviously dark objects to avoid being arrested.

 

“Welcome home, Draco, dear, and welcome to Malfoy manor, Gaara.” Narcissa was the first to break the silence, offering an economical smile to her son and an appraising look to Gaara. “I am Narcissa Malfoy and this is my husband Lucius.”

 

She proffered her hand to him but obviously not to be shaken. He’d seen Rock Lee take that pink-haired girl’s hand in this position and kiss it, but that was an overture for romance so perhaps it would be inappropriate to do the same. A second passed and he was clearly expected to do something so he did the only thing that he could think of and kissed her ring. It was an awkward movement but clearly not a wholly inappropriate one, earning him the thinnest smile from her.

 

Lucius didn’t look all too interested in exchanging pleasantries with him but offered his own hand, this time in the more familiar position that invited a handshake. His hand was smooth and soft and clearly had never worked a day in its life. “I’ve been hearing some interesting things about you, Gaara. Quite unusual for someone so new to our country, still in school, to become so talked about. I hope you can live up to your reputation.”

 

Gaara thought for a second and then sent up his sand, ‘I have more than a few reputations. People like to talk.’

 

Both the adults were wide-eyed but once they had finished reading they calmed and schooled their features, and Narcissa spoke, “Well, Draco has told us about your lost voice and your peculiar affinity with sand spells, but it is quite the sight to see. You really must tell us how you came upon such an ability sometime.”

 

“Yes, you really must.” Lucius chipped in, smirking. “Draco, show your guest around the manor before dinner, your mother and I have some matters to discuss in private.” He swiftly turned and marched out of the cavernous foyer into what looked like a luxurious drawing room, followed immediately by Narcissa who, like her husband, didn’t spare a backwards glance to her son and guest.

 

Draco stood still for a few moments, presumably still processing the last few minutes with his parents and what they might have meant, before he snapped out of his daze and hurriedly beckoned Gaara to follow him. He led Gaara through the multitude of hallways and rooms that seemed utterly superfluous to the military man in Gaara, especially the empty guest rooms that numbered in the double digits.

 

Draco explained that his family used to have a house elf that did all the cleaning and cooking but Potter had freed it and now they had to pay squibs to do it. Very inconvenient and expensive compared to having Dobby do all the work, but that meddlesome Gryffindor had forced their hands.

 

Draco would never admit it but he missed Dobby a little. The family slave had known how he liked things and had been... nice, in his stupid, simple, idiotic way.

 

Draco briefly showed Gaara outside into the gardens for a look in the frigid December cold. All the bushes and trees were neatly trimmed and maintained despite the inhospitable weather. Gaara spotted a peculiar shed in the distance and pointed it out and Draco said, “Oh, that’s where the groundskeeper puts the peacocks in the winter when it gets too cold out.” Draco turned to see that Gaara was staring at him, “What?”

 

Gaara wasn’t even sure he should be surprised anymore. Peacocks...

 

Both the teens soon grew cold and returned inside and continued the tour, the platinum-blond showing Gaara around to the expansive dining rooms (multiple), to the enormous ball room with covered furniture and immaculately polished stone floor, and to the library where Gaara wanted to spend the majority of his time over the coming weeks. After a little prompting, Draco also showed him around to the kitchens and to nearby bathrooms, and to where Draco and his parents slept in case of emergencies. They walked quickly past Lucius’s study but Draco warned him not to go in there, especially not if his father was in the house.

 

It was already late when they had arrived at the manor, so by the time Gaara and Draco concluded their wandering it was time to sit down for dinner with mister and missus Malfoy. The dinner table was long and heavy and made out of a dark wood that Gaara didn’t want to risk marking. The Malfoy parents sat at opposite ends of the expansive table while Gaara and Draco sat across from one another in the middle. The seating configuration made it tricky for Gaara as he had to pretend not to struggle to hear whenever either adult spoke in their elegantly soft dining voices from the considerable distance. He didn’t want to look simple.

 

Gaara noticed that Lucius spoke almost entirely to him over dinner, sparing his son only fleeting comments or pleasantries and, only talking to his wife to add to what she had said or to include her in the conversation. He chalked Lucius’s attitude to his wife up to the actual physical distance between them at the dinner table (and internally tried to work out how they heard each other speaking), but the way he spoke to and looked at Draco was troubling. He had feared that Lucius was physically abusive to his friend after seeing Draco’s boggart attack him, and had planned to put an abrupt stop to it if he needed to over the holidays. But now Gaara understood it was something else, something perhaps more damaging, Lucius was just a cold man who starved his son of love. A couple of assassination attempts and a dead wife and he would be a dead ringer for Gaara’s father.

 

Worst yet, unlike physical attacks that he could easily stop in a heartbeat (stopping the heartbeat would probably do the trick, though) but emotional abuse wasn’t something he could stop so easily. And he sure as hell wasn’t mentally stable or healthy enough to be a crutch for a similarly messed up boy.

 

All through this deliberation, small talk abounded and Gaara sedately ate his meal, which he was surprised to find was even more sumptuous than Hogwarts’ banquets.

 

“I apologise, Gaara, if Draco’s proclivity towards showing off left you feeling uncomfortable. I’m sure you are somewhat unused to such surroundings; Draco can forget, sometimes, that others who weren’t raised in such splendour can feel unsettled in our home.”

 

Gaara didn’t know which to be more upset about: the barely veiled insult, or how upset Draco looked as he stared down at his food.

 

‘It is certainly different. My home is somewhat larger than your house, but my mansion doesn’t have any gardens.’ Gaara’s expression didn’t shift at all as he spelt the words out, purposefully pausing his eating to mimic dinnertime conversation. Some people seemed to find it rude when he completely ignored them as he _talked_ to them. ‘Though it did have some greenhouses.’ Gaara sand finished as an afterthought.

 

Lucius stared blankly at him for a few moments, as did Draco and Narcissa, before turning back to his meal.

 

Gaara didn’t usually like to brag, but when it was for a good cause he was willing to make an exception. He had only actually moved into the Kazekage mansion recently, with the expectation being that he would become the next village leader when he was ready. Baki, as interim leader, had been counting the days until Gaara was able to take up his position.

 

After Lucius had stumbled at his parried barb, Narcissa took up the reigns of the conversation and continued the small talk around the table, asking Draco and Gaara about their studies and favourite subjects (Potions for Draco, anything other than Potions for Gaara), any other friends they had socialised with in Slytherin. Eventually Narcissa took up a subject that Lucius had been waiting to come up, if his quick interjection was any indication.

 

“Gaara, how has your spellcasting come along? Draco has told us that you initially had a little difficulty with performing spells.” Narcissa was nursing her wine, having finished with her starter course already.

 

“Yes, we were quite concerned for you. You come from an entirely magical family so it must have been very upsetting when you arrived at Hogwarts and weren’t able to keep up with the classes there. I suppose in _your country_ , they move at a slower pace. Or perhaps they just don’t teach the same range that Hogwarts offers their students.” Lucius seemed to be back up to full speed again after his little stumble.

 

Gaara paused, as Draco noticed he did whenever the red-head considered speaking about his home. ‘My spellwork is improving, thank you.’ Draco hid a derrisive snort in his goblet.

 

‘In my home country, we are taught more specific skills from an early age. Though we do not call it magic there, it amounts to the same thing. My family has been able to use what you call magic since before the formation of my country.’ Gaara figured his answer should satisfy Lucius’s fanatical, pureblood curiosity for the moment.

 

 Lucius dutifully rattled off the appropriate compliments for Gaara’s ancestry, secretly wondering if Gaara was telling the truth, followed by Narcissa asking some polite questions about his immediate family. He took his sweet time to answer them, finishing off his starter (a tasteful selection of pâtés and spreads) before he deigned to respond. He acted as if he was leisurely finishing his course whilst he debated what to share now.

 

‘I have a brother and sister back at home.’

 

“Oh really? Older or younger?” Narcissa asked without a moment’s hesitation, unknowingly stumbling into Gaara’s bubble of strict privacy. Draco, meanwhile, kicked himself for never having the guts to ask Gaara about his family directly.

 

‘I am the youngest and my sister is the oldest. Both of them are very accomplished.’

 

“What are their names?” Lucius chipped in, clicking his fingers loudly and summoning the half-blood maid to clear the table and bring out their main courses.

 

# ‘My sister is called Temari and my brother is Kankurō.’

# “Interesting names; are all the people where you are from given similar names?” Narcissa said.

# ‘Somewhat.’

# “What about your surname?” Everyone at the table turned to look at Draco as he spoke up abruptly after having lapsed into silence for the majority of the meal. He had been bursting to answer one of a myriad of mysteries surrounding Gaara, and now seemed like the best opportunity.

# ‘I don’t have one.’ Gaara didn’t blink or look at all concerned by his lack of a second name, in fact he looked like he was waiting for Draco to make his point.

 

“You... you don’t have surname? Do people in your homeland not usually use a second name?” Narcissa couldn’t imagine a world where one’s lineage wasn’t vital to be established upon introducing oneself to someone, neither could Draco or Lucius.

 

‘Typically, no. In my village, they aren’t used. Most other places in the surrounding lands use some form of family name.’ Gaara had had a similar conversation with his blonde friend in Konoha about Suna’s ostensible lack of surnames amongst its citizens and that airhead had been just as flummoxed.

 

“Doesn’t that make identifying the _right sort_ all the harder?”

 

‘Right sort?’

 

“Yes, wizards, purebloods. Magic users.” Lucius pressed on, concerned that Gaara might be from an entire culture of blood traitors.

 

‘Typically the clothing gives it away, as well as the social circles they travel in. But you can’t always know, even when they possess family names, unless they come from a well known clan.’

 

“Interesting. There is something that I feel many have neglected to ask, but where exactly do you come from, Gaara? I thought I was well versed with most magical cultures around the world and yet you might as well me a muggle for all I know about you and your culture.” Lucius smiled as he said it, but from the sweat beading on Draco’s brow, Gaara guessed he had just been dealt a harsh insult (by pureblood standards).

 

‘My home is called Sunagakure, which means village hidden by sand. My homeland is shrouded by secrecy so it’s no wonder you’ve never heard of the hidden villages.’ Gaara was quite enjoying the veal he’d been served, and the conversation was entertaining. It would serve as good practice for when he had political sit-downs with ally nations, except for Konoha, their current Hokage (and the probable successor) was not one for mincing words.

 

“Really, how mysterious.” The way Narcissa drawled the line made Gaara wonder if even she knew whether she was being sincere. “That’s far away, I suppose?”

 

‘Yes.’

 

“You had no problem travelling so far to go to school, so far away from your home and your family?” She continued.

 

‘I came to England because of another matter, and since I couldn’t get home immediately, I saw no reason not to enjoy the benefits of a first-rate magical education in the meantime.’

 

“It was suggested by some that Draco should have gone to the Durmstrang Institute because of its more liberal views the on magics that they teach, but we decided that it was simply too far to send him.” The cool composure Narcissa displayed completely belied the fact that the ‘some people’ who had wanted Draco sent away had been Lucius and the ‘we’ that had decided to keep him close by had been her. It was hard enough sending her precious son to the other end of the country.

 

‘He wouldn’t have fared very well there, I don’t imagine.’ Gaara said, ignoring the startled and incredulous looks he received around the table. Draco, in particular, looked quite offended, and a little upset, by the apparent lack of faith Gaara had in him. ‘I’ve read a little about the institute and it sounds far too cold. No sane person could learn in a freezing school.’

 

The conversation lapsed for a few moments longer than a properly hosted dinner should as the Malfoys tried to process Gaara’s logic.

 

Eventually they moved on to the Quidditch game that had almost seen Draco lose his life, for which the Malfoy males were very begrudgingly thankful to Dumbledore for saving. They discussed the dementors posted at the school and Lucius gave no indication that he had been talking to the Minister for Magic that very afternoon about that subject.

 

“Gaara, do you know why Sirius Black was sent to Azkaban?” Draco blushing furiously after his mother had, with all the proper deportment and manners expected of her standing, risen from her chair, walked over to Draco and wiped his cheek with her napkin to rid it of the speck of gravy no one else had seen. Her face didn’t show compassion or even interest, but Gaara smirked imperceptibly at the sign that at least one of the Malfoy adults cared about Draco. Perhaps both of Draco’s parents truly did love him like any good parent should, and they both just held onto their masks of indifference and hostility because a guest was present. He hoped so.

 

But he doubted it in Lucius’ case.

 

Nonetheless, it was very funny watching his friend being embarrassed by his mother.

 

Dessert that night was treacle tarts, which Gaara was ashamed to see Draco eat with such vigour as he knew the only reason that the Malfoy child would never partake of his apparently favourite sweet at Hogwarts was because it was also Harry Potter’s preferred pudding. Behind all of the politics and bigotry, Draco really was still a child.

 

After dinner, they all retired to the drawing room and quietly read for an hour before bed. Gaara was tempted to turn in early so that he could give Draco and his parents some time to themselves, but he’d found a very interesting book about obscure runic array theory that held a little promise regarding his ongoing search and didn’t want to put it down. Sadly, near the middle the author finally wrote that most of his work had subsequently proven false or had been discredited.

 

It was Lucius who unilaterally decided they were all tired enough to go to bed, and Narcissa ushered he and Draco out to the grand staircase. Gaara spelled out a ‘thank you’ and ‘good night’ before walking up his set of stairs to the wing of the mansion that housed the guest rooms, but he lingered at the top for a moment.

 

He hid in the shadows and watched as Narcissa checked the coast was clear and then pulled Draco into a hug and kissed him repeatedly, as if waiting had made her even more frantic. They exchanged a few hushed words that Gaara believed were heartfelt and emotional, until Lucius approached and both straightened up and then all three passed around some officious looking sentiments, then all three trudged up the stars to their bedrooms in silence.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

A few days into the holiday, Draco rapped lightly on his father’s study door and waited for permission to enter.

 

Things had been slow to start with, his parents and Gaara being unsure of how to act around each other, but eventually things had eased and Gaara had felt free enough to do his own thing, as he was wont to do wherever he was staying, it seemed.

 

That very morning, Gaara had walked in from his morning exercises and whilst Lucius and Narcissa had privately derided their houseguest for performing such plebeian/muggle activities, Draco incredulously asked “Don’t you ever sweat?” Looking at Gaara’s pristine appearance after spending over an hour performing feats that Draco wouldn’t stand a chance doing.

 

To which Gaara answered, in the most deadpan manner a person who cannot speak could manage, ‘In this weather?’

 

The desert dweller was far from overheating in the frosty south-western winter.

 

“Come.” His father beckoned from inside.

 

His father was completing the final preparations for the Malfoy Christmas party and Draco had a complication he had been avoiding giving to his father that couldn’t feasibly wait any longer.

 

“What do you need, Draco?” His father disliked the social side of his obligations, being a die-hard businessman and politician through and through, so these party functions were usually left to his dutiful wife, except when they required his personal touch. Such as now when he needed to invite everyone of note to the party and even his well-connected wife couldn’t be expected to know or remember the countless names of his co-workers.

 

“It’s about the guest list, father...” Draco had spent the better part of an hour in the library silently practicing how he would word his request in his head but it had all suddenly left him.

 

“What about it?” Lucius turned to look at his son and heir, mention of what he was working on garnering his attention.

 

“Well, I want to invite a few more guests.”

 

Draco had floated this idea past Gaara earlier and his friend had, with all his oblivious lack of fear or social grace, told Draco to do it if it was what he wanted.

 

Lucius raised his eyebrow at his son’s request. All of Draco’s friends (their families) had already been invited, when it was polite to send such invitations. Draco knew just as well as he that any invitation sent out a week before the party could only been seen as an insult to any upstanding family.

 

“Whom would you like to invite?”

 

“Some friends from school, father.”

 

“I’ve already invited all of your school friends; long since.”

 

“Not them, I mean my other friends.”

 

“Other friends? Surely you haven’t been fraternising with the other houses or _mudbloods_.” There was no question in Lucius’ glare.

 

“O-of course not, father. I meant some of the moderates from Slytherin, sir. I’ve come to know a few of them this year, oh, and Luna Lovegood, from Ravenclaw. Her father owns the Quibbler.”

 

His piercing stare not letting up, Lucius continued, “Who from Slytherin?”

 

“Roy Norbel, Tracey Davis, and Miles Bletchley.”

 

“The Bletchley boy is on the Quidditch team so I suppose I can make an exception for his parents, but I won’t be inviting the Norbels. And as for the Davis’s, I can only wonder what could have inspired you to want to invite that blood-traitor family into this house. It’s one thing to have moderates here, _that_ I can explain away as your youthful indiscretion, but to have a Davis come would be an insult to every one of our guests.” Lucius didn’t even deign to mention Tracey’s ‘mudblood’ mother personally.

 

“And the Quibbler is a rag; you shouldn’t be associating with other houses in the first place. Though at least you had the sense not to go near a Hufflepuff or, god forbid, a Gryffindor.”

 

Draco took a breath, “Of course we couldn’t invite a muggle or someone married to one, but...” Draco cursed in his head, he had been practicing this, “but the moderates are an untapped resource in Slytherin. None of the pureblood families will associate with them, so no one is exploiting any power or financial resources they hold, yet. It might not look too good in the short term, but eventually we will be even more prosperous, and we will still be above those lower families who we can monopolise. And even though the Quibbler is filled with nonsense, it is the fourth largest weekly publication in Britain and can you ever really control enough media?” None of this Draco believed, but it sounded believable.

 

...right?

 

Lucius regarded Draco for a long time, neither moving an inch until Lucius sighed and turned back around to his desk.

 

“I sometimes forget how impetuous the younger generation can be. I suppose it will serve as enough of a message that we sent out the invitations this close to the event. I will invite the Bletchleys, the Norbels, the...” Lucius sighed, “the Lovegoods, and miss Davis. I expect them to behave properly and to understand their place at the party, Draco. I will have to explain to our other guests why they are there on the night.”

 

“Oh, thank you, father.” Draco understood that in other, less prestigious families, this would have been the time for a son to hug his father, but Draco held no such peculiar notions and settled for a hybrid nod/bow and backed out of the room and left his father to finishing the arrangements, and now the guest list.

 

Sweating buckets, he went back to the library to sink into a chair and breathe into a paper bag. Gaara gave him a small smile from behind his huge book.

 

That had been terrifying for Draco, so much so that he was simply glad not to need a change of trousers. It seemed like a small victory in hindsight, but any stand made against his father was a monumental one in Draco’s eyes. It would be great to have friends at the party that he himself had picked, and Luna.

 

He had asked Gaara if there was anybody he would like to invite, purely as a courtesy seeing as Gaara was as far from sociable as Draco suspected it was possible of being, shy of becoming a full blown Dark Lord, but Gaara had taken the question seriously and thought about it. A day later, Gaara had supplied Draco with Luna Lovegood and Draco couldn’t see any reason, offhand, to deny Gaara. An airhead Ravenclaw certainly wasn’t going to get him in any more trouble than Tracey Davis. That was for sure.

 

Meanwhile, Lucius was quietly glad that his son was becoming so ambitious and cunning. It was an interesting gambit, one that Lucius wasn’t entirely convinced would be as effective as Draco had said, but he could allow Draco a few liberties here and there, as a teaching aid.

 

However, as essential as ambition was to prosperity, it could often hinder a family’s wealth and status if one of their sons became overly ambitious, overstretched and exposed weakness. One such weakness was Gaara, which Lucius had told Draco only a few days before.

 

He didn’t know all that much about Gaara, even after the boy had come to stay in his home, but no matter who (or what) his son had grown attached to, he was duty bound to offer these sage words of advice, as he had been given by his own father: ‘don’t put all of your eggs in one basket.’

 

If Lucius could gain the Dark Lord’s utmost confidence and then survive Voldemort’s downfall, Draco could climb and feed his hungry ambition and then cast aside Gaara if he ever came to undermine their family’s beliefs or success.

 

...maybe these moderates wouldn’t even come...

 

...then again, like hell was the prestigious Malfoy Christmas party going to be turned down by such lowly people!

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

The boys were relaxing in Draco’s room, as the Malfoy heir tried in vain to catch his breath and warm back up after he had been unceremoniously dragged out into the grounds that morning by Gaara for ‘training’ again. Gaara had even known to avoid Lucius and Narcissa’s attention as he literally dragged their son kicking and screaming into the winter cold for rigorous and unwanted exercise.

 

On the bright side, if there even was one, Draco had managed to substitute a few circuits of the manor with a little illegal, under-aged spell practice that he successfully convinced Gaara he needed more than Draco needed the physical training. The very real risk of accidental spell damage was more than worth it, to watch the superior red head struggling with spells that even Longbottom had mastered at the beginning of the year.

 

That being said, his good cheer wouldn’t go very fair to thawing out his poor toes which he was convinced were frostbitten despite all the evidence to the contrary.

 

Evidence such as no signs of frostbite.

 

To further lift his mood, Draco indulged in the greatest British pastime (other than tea-drinking and commenting on the weather): complaining.

 

“And I told mother that I _needed_ the Firebolt for school, but she wouldn’t listen. Would you believe it; she said that the old Nimbus 2001’s were ‘fine’ for Quidditch? Can you imagine? She would rather buy me an old model.”

 

Gaara was vaguely aware that Draco was talking about kinds of brooms.

 

“And when I went to father after that, I tried explaining how important it was, but it was like he didn’t care. He acted like I just wanted it for fun, but _you_ know that I need it to win. It’s for Slytherin, really.”

 

Gaara was reading a vaguely interesting book that described something called ‘Homing Magycs’ that he figured could help him find a way home, though he knew this one was a tenuous link. Still, it wasn’t going to be anything obvious so he would have to try with these lesser known spells.

 

“And mother had the gall to suggest pulling me out of Quidditch altogether, as if I’m so delicate that a single dementor attack could stop me.”

 

Gaara thought it was funny how dramatically Draco’s attitude to danger had changed. The spoilt blond was still a long way off from being a headstrong Gryffindor, but he was no longer slithering along on his belly so shamefully.

 

“Oh, mother said she wanted to speak to you later today. Something to do with the party tomorrow, I think. It’s probably just a last minute alteration to your dress robes or something.” Draco had been speaking for minutes uninterrupted but he only now remembered to inform Gaara something he had likely been told hours earlier at breakfast. Typical.

 

The episode of Gaara being fitted for his dress robes was one he would rather forget and one that would best left unsaid. Gaara was a scary person, and Narcissa was scary enough to force him.

 

A littler later, Gaara put down his book and wandered down to the drawing room where Narcissa had asked him to meet her, alone. He might have been wary of such a clandestine meeting if it had involved Lucius, but Draco had mentioned the man was in his study currently. Narcissa had been nothing but kind to him, except during the fitting, so he didn’t walk to the drawing room with any real sort of trepidation.

 

He knocked lightly and walked in to see Narcissa standing before a small dining table with an elaborate table setting, along with a variety of useless utensils and superfluous plates that Gaara felt were woefully inefficient compared to his beloved chopsticks and small bowl.

 

He looked at the curious set up and wondered whether Draco’s mother was eating on her own tonight, in the wrong room...

 

“Good evening Gaara. I hope you’re well.” She looked him over as if she did actually care, which was strange because her taut face appeared anything but concerned. Gaara wasn’t adept at reading emotions, so he tended to doubt his interpretations in these situations.

 

“Now, I know you come from a prominent family in your homeland, but you do not know the proper etiquette of Britain,” She wasn’t brokering an argument, she was making a statement of fact. “So I have decided to run you through the basics you should have learned years ago. Draco received elocution lessons when he was six, so there’s no reason you shouldn’t be able to learn enough to get by tomorrow night.”

 

Gaara exhaled, which would have sounded like a loud groan if he had a functioning voice box, at the prospect of being taught table manners. Yashamaru had taught him what little he knew of manners, and that had more involved how to hold chopsticks, and that it wasn’t alright to try and kill a cook because they hadn’t made a dish right.

 

Gaara figured the latter would still apply here.

 

“Firstly I suppose we can forgo correcting your posture since you hold yourself very well, considering your lack of training. Just don’t slouch at all. Now, when you sit at the table, you must first wait for any nearby ladies to be sat first. When you sit, immediately pull out your napkin and lay it across your lap. Now, show me how you sit at the table and we’ll see what we can do.”

 

Thus began the longest two hours in Gaara’s life since he had fallen off of the hippogriff and had to limp through the Forbidden Forrest with broken bones and bruises all over his body. And at least then he hadn’t been so bored.

 

Draco’s mother fussed over every fastidious detail of what he thought was a fairly simple affair. He was glad to see that some manners spanned dimensions, like the rule that said one shouldn’t eat with their mouth open. The array of knives and forks, however, was entirely alien to him. The range of cutlery would have surely put most of his village’s weapon stores to shame and he couldn’t help but lament the brain capacity now occupied by knowledge of the correct forks to use for fish, cheese, meat and the half dozen other uses he couldn’t have imagined previously.

 

Narcissa never lost patience when she could tell (somehow) that Gaara’s mind had begun to wander or his less than abundant enthusiasm had begun to flag. It was odd being around a woman who was, by all accounts, cold and distant and yet getting the distinct impression that she not only cared, but that she was actually a warm, kind person.

 

It was just something about her, something he couldn’t consciously discern. And after all those pictures Temari had showed him to explain what different faces meant...

 

Wasted.

 

Gaara regularly ran for miles, could jump over tall walls, could kill dozens and read for hours on end without the slightest fatigue, but at the end of those lesson he was so utterly glad Narcissa wasn’t going to insist on dancing lessons. After all, there was only so much that could be achieved in one evening.

 

Narcissa was happy with how receptive Gaara had been to the whole lesson, as she had been prepared to deal with an obstinate child like her darling Draco had been when he was little. He had learned enough that tomorrow night he would at least appear civilised, if perhaps a little rough around the edges.

 

She liked Gaara, and she liked what he had done for her beloved son. He was sweet, too, and more sensitive than he wanted to let on. She had grown up as a Black, and could see through even the most stoic sociopaths, and Gaara was no different.

 

Like everyone else, she knew precious little about Gaara, even after multiple dinner conversations where Lucius and she interrogated him for details, but what she did know was troubling. And nothing more than the infamous tale of the boggart that Draco had confided in her because it had upset him so. Gaara’s greatest fear had apparently been his own mother, and he had then proceeded to kill the boggart, brutally if Draco’s tall tales were to be believed. She hadn’t managed to wheedle out what Draco’s had been.

 

She saw something in Gaara that it seemed Severus, Lucius, Dumbledore and even Draco couldn’t see: a vulnerable child. Or maybe she was becoming soft in her later years...

 

She’d have to go and visit Bella to see if she was losing her edge. Her incarcerated sister had never been one to shy away from telling it like she saw it, especially when it came to family.

 

Gaara excused himself with a bow and she found herself gifting him with a short smile before he swept out of the room, probably in fear of more lessons, and Narcissa decided to fix herself a stiff drink before she went down to meet Lucius. He had been resolving an issue with the caterers all day and was bound to be in a foul mood. She had her work cut out for her this evening, to alleviate her husband’s bad mood in time for dinner.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

“You look fine; like a gentleman, even. If you’d like, I have a potion that could smooth your hair down a bit.” Draco said as he finished fussing over Gaara’s new dress robes, making sure they were all draping and flat in the right places. The shinobi had to swat his friend’s hands away in the end because Draco’s nervous, obsessive badgering was bugging him.

 

Gaara refused the hair concoction and stepped down from the dressing podium. It was about time for them to join the Malfoy elders downstairs and start receiving the guests. The adults had explained earlier that Gaara and Draco would only be expected to greet the first few parties to arrive before they could adjourn to the ballroom and socialise.

 

Gaara had been told, by each member of the household separately at one point or another, that he wasn’t allowed to sneak off during the middle of the party to read or hide. Draco had finished this admonishment with the foreboding statement that he would not be letting Gaara out of his sight all evening.

 

Both of the finely dressed young men descended to the entrance hall, where they found the equally well adorned Malfoy parents waiting by the floo without so much as a word passing between them. They didn’t spare a comment for the boys when they joined them at the fireplace, though Narcissa did take the quiet moment as an opportunity to henpeck Draco one last time, which he looked mortified by.

 

Gaara got his own turn, though, as Narcissa tried in vain to flatten down his hair a little. Still, he was better off than Draco, but he still wished he had been allowed to carry more than a handful of sand this evening, as his ultimate defence was definitely called for here.

 

The green fire flared, signalling the first arrival and an abrupt end to Narcissa’s attempts to flatten Gaara’s unruly crimson hair. The Crabbe family were the first to arrive, unfashionably early, and unfashionably dressed as it happened.

 

Crabbe senior, a stocky and dull looking man had a greasy smile spread on his face as he materialised amongst the flames, obviously having had to muster the expression before he even entered the floo network. His wife was similarly large, but more muscular than fat, and sporting the same insincere smile on her painted lips. And following close behind was Crabbe junior, who tried his hardest to maintain his sickeningly unconvincing smile even when he spotted Gaara (who was now even scarier as he was amongst the dreaded Malfoys and dressed like a pureblood).

 

The entire Crabbe clan took turns to give Gaara suspicious, fearful and condemning looks; giving him the impression that Crabbe had told his family about their unfortunate encounter on the first night in castle.

 

Any proliferation of that story would have been very damaging a few months ago, but he figured now it would either be considered as another myth surrounding him or it would be taken seriously, and it wasn’t like Draco would care anymore, and the opinions of the others in the castle weren’t at all important.

 

Lucius and Narcissa did their duty as hosts and greeted their guests, but Lucius let it be known in his usual subtle manner that he didn’t think much of them and that arriving early was anything but endearing.

 

Vincent Crabbe senior pulled a tiny, brightly wrapped package out of his robes and magically re-enlarged it and handed it to the host, with a “Merry Christmas,” that was sedately returned, though without a reciprocal gift. Narcissa had been shopping for months and they would be sending out their gifts on Christmas day as they always had. They even hired a small fleet of owls to do the delivering promptly in the morning.

 

Small talk was exchanged between the adults whilst the children awkwardly stood apart. Even before the great Slytherin schism of this year, Draco had precious little to say to his two henchmen, and now that they weren’t even ‘friends’, he really didn’t know what to say, so settled on a indifferent silence. Gaara made it look cool so Draco figured he’d give it a try.

 

Only a minute or two after the first family arrived, the second came out of the fireplace in something of a rush. The Goyles had an identical set of smiles plastered on their faces when they arrived, though they slipped a mite when they spotted that the Crabbes had beaten them to the punch.

 

It was obvious to Draco that the two families knew that Lucius no longer had any real need for them, since their sons no longer protected Draco, and they were desperate to regain favour with the most prominent pureblood in Britain. Luckily, Lucius had made it clear recently that his initial insistence that Draco make up with Crabbe and Goyle had long since faded and the Malfoy lord was glad to be rid of the odious connection to those families.

 

It now just pained them all that they still had to interact with them at these functions. Especially with their sad attempts as winning the Malfoy’s favour once again.

 

They were a step above blood-traitors and moderates, a small one.

 

Next to the party came the Norbels, dressed to the nines and looking a little nervous. Draco figured that they hadn’t had cause to wear their finest dress robes in quite some time, and their early arrival was a (forgivable) faux pas as a result of their removal from high society functions. It was typically unfashionable of pariahs to try to arrive ‘on time’ to a party, but since no one thought anything of the Norbel family to begin with, they weren’t treated harshly for their misstep.

 

The parents went to greet the Malfoy elders and thank them for the kind invitation and were treated to thinly veiled insults and contempt, which no one was surprised by. Lucius had an image to keep in polite society and it was expected that he treat families like the Norbels, guests or not, like trash.

 

Draco took the opportunity of his parents’ distraction to approach Roy and say hello, forgoing the obvious apologies that were due since such sentiments would betray the divergence of his beliefs from those of his family. He also took the precaution of pulling Gaara forward with him, not willing to let him slip off with those dastardly ‘shinobi’ skills of his whilst everyone was distracted.

 

The tug Draco felt told him that Gaara had just been about to slip off, though looking at his face gave nothing away.

 

“Good evening, and welcome.” Draco said, and with a nudge he encouraged Gaara to nod to Roy too.

 

“Merry Christmas Draco, merry Christmas Gaara. Thank you so much for inviting us. I don’t think I’ve seen my mother so excited since I got my Hogwarts letter.” He said with a beaming smile.

 

Draco smiled back and then dropped it before someone saw him looking so happy around a moderate. He could get away with such behaviour at school but here it could damage his father’s reputation. What also made him frown was telling Roy, in whispers and hushed tones, how the evening had to be played out. They couldn’t spend too long together; he shouldn’t act friendly with any of the other purebloods there; his parents should keep their distance from pretty much anyone; and they should stick to safe topics that couldn’t conceivably elicit reproach if they were addressed by another party-goer.

 

Draco was afraid that these rules, over which he had poured for hours, would offend Roy (and his other moderate guests) but to the contrary, his friend nodded with a solemnity the young Malfoy wouldn’t have expected from his usually upbeat companion. It seemed that Roy, and even his parents, understood that their place at this party was one of novelty and that it was a privilege to even be invited.

 

Truthfully, one of the biggest reasons Draco had decided to ask for his friends to come, other than for their limited company, was because overall it would probably benefit their respective businesses greatly to be seen at the social event of the season. Even the Lovegoods might see a rise in Quibbler sales, if only as a sign of deference from lesser families towing the Malfoy line after it was seen that they were respectable enough to receive a (late) invitation to the party.

 

Draco would have taken his friend and his friend’s family and spirited them away to the ballroom but he didn’t want to risk the others arriving in his absence, nor did he want to leave the Norbels on their own in the hall where an ‘accident’ might befall them. These things did tend to happen at these parties.

 

Thank goodness Aunt Bellatrix was still safely in Azkaban. Accidents had sharply declined in her absence, not that Lucius or Narcissa cared to keep track of such things.

 

A few more eager guests arrived, including a few politicians Draco insisted Gaara should know, for some reason or another. Finally, a single young woman arrived, which was almost unheard of for such an event. Tracey was wearing an expensive looking gown, and Roy not-so-subtly pondered whether the quality of her finery was the happy benefit of her parents not having to update their own wardrobes for the night. Luckily she didn’t hear as she was going through a shortened greeting from the Malfoy adults, who all but shooed her towards the Norbel family.

 

After all, a young woman couldn’t stand on her own all evening and no one else there would want to be seen with a member of the Davis family. The only ones who could stomach it, other than the children, were a few of the secretly liberal politicians, and they were too afraid for their careers.

 

As more families and prominent individuals came in through the floo, Lucius told Draco to lead the bustling entry hall full of guests to the main function room.

 

Draco panicked but Gaara, with an exaggerated sigh, motioned Draco onwards and moved to stand near the Malfoy adults. He intended to stay put and watch out for anyone else Draco had invited. Lucius and Narcissa paid their silent guest little heed as they continued to chatter away with the guests. They assumed he was waiting for his Ravenclaw friend, or planning to sneak away.

 

Narcissa gently brought Gaara closer to them and introduced him to the head of... and Gaara zoned out as the head of one of the purest families in Yorkshire (he didn’t know where that country was located) began to prattle on about his days in Slytherin when he was a lad.

 

Apparently the first thing adults liked to talk to kids about was their school days. Gaara was lucky that he had a good excuse for not joining the conversation.

 

Narcissa’s presence at his side kept him from totally zoning out and risking the honourable Lord Someone from discovering his deep and unending disinterest. It was at times like these, and certainly at that damned robe-fitting, that Draco’s mother reminded Gaara of his sister. Temari was one of the few strong women he came into regular contact with at home, and he had come to respect (read:fear) that strength. He often wondered if his mother might have been like that too. He’d asked his uncle when he was a child, but other than factual information and that she loved him...

 

He had never really known what his mother was like, but considering Temari’s personality, and knowing that his mother had had to deal with his father, he liked to think she could have given Narcissa a run for her money.

 

A few dozen more witches and wizards strolled through the floo before someone he was remotely interested in came through. Luna popped in first, backwards, and then followed her surprisingly normal looking parent. The senior Lovegood was blonde like his daughter but did not observe his surroundings with the same... curiosity that had led to Luna’s colourful nickname.

 

Xenophillius brazenly marched up to Lucius and stuck his hand out to shake, totally ignoring the grimace on Lucius’s face and the glares surrounding them. Tense as could be, Lucius shook the hand presented to him but sneered the whole time. When it was broken off, Gaara imagined the pureblood had considered taking a moment to clean his hands off but had reconsidered since the Lovegoods were still technically invited guests. Mr Lovegood was also greeted by Narcissa who plastered on the same false smile that she had used to greet every newly arrived guest. Gaara liked that.

 

Since Draco was elsewhere, Gaara figured it was up to him to welcome Luna to the Malfoy mansion. Plus, there was a good chance that she might wander off into a dangerous area if she wasn’t watched like a hawk. Though, by the way that Luna’s father kept glancing at her, he guessed she was more than used to it by now. Xenophillius reminded Gaara of toned-down version of his daughter.

 

“Hello Gaara. It’s nice to see you again. Thank you very much for inviting me a party.” Luna was dressed in a fancy little dress and was smiling widely. For some reason, she kept looking Gaara in the eyes tonight.

 

Xenophillius leaned over to his daughter, aware of the Malfoy’s watching, “No, dear, it was the Malfoy family who invited us their party.”

 

Luna just looked up at her father with a blank stare before smiling and turning back to Gaara. “I saw a dead cat yesterday.”

 

Bizarre as it was, Gaara couldn’t deny that Luna’s conversations were much more engaging than the drivel he had had to endure so far that evening. Luckily, it appeared that Lucius was so bewildered by Luna’s eccentricities that he was choosing to ignore her presence altogether, rather than scorn her for remaining near Gaara and the greeting party. The adult Lovegood stood back a little and waited patiently, clearly understanding his place in all of this.

 

With Gaara otherwise engaged, the Malfoys moved to ignore the blemishes on their party. But Gaara noticed that Lucius only truly scowled when he saw the Minister for Magic, Cornelius Fudge, arrive, before wiping away the look and smiling like he was greeting an old friend.

 

He was a short man, Gaara hypocritically noted, and not at all what he imagined the leader of such a powerful country as this. Clearly he was more like the Daimyō than the Kage of this land, though he was given to believe that this man _had_ actually been elected.

 

A curious state of affairs, but then, perhaps there was more to Fudge than met the eye. Logically, there had to be.

 

The Minister had an entourage with him who flocked about him in a very hindering sort of way, but that did nothing to dim the red-faced smile from Fudge’s person. Assuming he had come straight from his office, Gaara couldn’t imagine why he was looking so red and out of breath. Were all wizards so uniformly out of shape even by civilian standards?

 

Hell, according to most wizards, Draco could be classed as an athlete for his involvement in the House Quidditch cup. Gaara would have called him a lunatic long before a sportsman, or anything approaching it, for his broom-riding activities.

 

But then, Draco had often called him similar names for his physical fitness so Gaara supposed he shouldn’t be too quick to judge.

 

Contrary to the visage presented to him, Gaara had to marvel at the atmosphere that the unassuming politician’s presence had on the room. Conversations quieted, people turned, some looked eager whilst other looked ill. Fascinating.

 

Obviously the politics of this world were even more subtle and complex than those of his own.

 

...Which was a given in any world where the main requisite for leadership wasn’t decided primarily on one’s fighting ability.

 

Luna seemed content to ignore the atmosphere in the room, as Gaara believed she always had, and continued to chat away to him. She asked how he had liked it at the Malfoy’s home and if any of the peacocks had tried to escape recently. He answered honestly to all of the questions directed at him, used to this strange manner of his... acquaintance’s...friend’s... of Luna’s.

 

A problem presented itself when a couple of Draco’s old friends appeared with their parents and Draco had yet to return from showing the other guests to the ballroom. He probably got caught in a boring conversation. Those traps were all around this night.

 

As expected, the children were all lumped together, these events only supposed to attract those of like-mind and thus their children should naturally get along famously. And this was one of the issues with trying to stir things up.

 

The Slytherins had always held a cool arrogance around Gaara as long as they held him at a significant distance, but now that they were forced into close quarters they found themselves a little more indifferent than their hostile natures might otherwise have dictated. Still, it did absolutely nothing to quell Luna’s chattyness. Gaara couldn’t imagine anything that could, and he had been trying since she arrived.

 

He was just thinking of alternative methods of escaping when he noticed the looks the Slytherin teens were throwing at Luna, who had moved on to something about a conspiracy of Spanish wizards to monopolise all of the bees in the world. They were too afraid to openly scorn Gaara despite his many shortcomings in their eyes, but Luna was an outsider and was, even by Gaara’s admittance, annoying, so they did nothing to hide their hatred.

 

Gaara might have been convinced that Luna truly didn’t notice her schoolmates’ looks were it not for the fact that she was looking everywhere but in their direction, and she was getting even chattier, if that was possible.

 

He found Luna annoying, and he still wasn’t sure what constituted a friend but he didn’t she qualified, but even so, he found himself glaring directly at the Slytherins and then he growled.

 

He didn’t often _growl_ at people, even when he was in the habit of causing spontaneous bouts of incontinence in his home village when he was younger. Evidently something has upset him, but what?

 

Gaara puzzled over what had put him in such a bad mood so suddenly until he admitted that it probably was because they were acting so coldly to his friend. (He was going to have spend some time in the coming days trying to discern what his standards for friends were, considering who he had a tendency to socialise with in this world and his own.)

 

The Slytherins took notice of the silent (serial-killer-ish) teen’s threatening within seconds and were cowed quickly. Wondering how much he could get away with before one of the adults intervened, Gaara advanced on the cowering Slytherin snobs with less than pacifistic intentions.

 

Fortunately for all involved, Draco was the one to intervene and before Gaara worked out some of his misplaced aggression on his classmates.

 

“Well...” He interjected, placing himself between Gaara and the people stupid enough to set him off, “if you would be kind enough to follow me, I can show you all to the main event.”

 

As if what they had been suffering through so far might actually be considered a social event. If it really was just a precursor to the night’s main event, the festivities would likely involve serious physical torture.

 

Gaara looked on with a smirk as the teenagers were hot on Draco’s heels as the next lot of party-goers was ferried to the ballroom. And in all of this tenseness and pressure, Luna had hardly stopped for breath as she continued on with her ramblings. She was a nervous talker.

 

...Well, she was naturally a talker, and a loquacious, nervous chatterbox when stressed.

 

It wasn’t until the crowd had turned the corner that Gaara realised that Luna had failed to accompany the group that included her parents (and the Minister of Magic). As irritating as her theories and ideas were, Gaara found himself enjoying the presence of a mindless distraction in this boring evening. Plus, in a tenuous way, Luna reminded him of his equally vapid blonde friend back home. Gaara was a creature of habit and he gravitated towards the familiar, he was finding.

 

At least this one wasn’t reminiscing about the time he defeated a comrade by farting in his face.

 

For all of his refinement and sophistication, Gaara really didn’t have the highest standards for friendship.

 

As time wore on, Gaara even engaged Luna a little, adding his own ideas to her outlandish theories and conspiracies. The only way to deal with Luna, Gaara found, was to just humour her, otherwise it brought conversations to a halt.  Plus, some of them were arguably quite amusing.

 

He was just considering the realistic likelihood of the muggle royal family actually being made up of human-shaped reptiles (admittedly, rather low) when the final young party guest was thrown into their midst. Luckily, it was the ever-friendly, if a little timid, Miles Bletchley. In fact, the only time Miles would step outside of himself was when it was concerning Quidditch. It was then that Gaara realised that Luna’s own lunacy did not preclude her from the cultural insanity of Quidditch.  It turned out that she was actually quite the fan...

 

Great.

 

Time in all of its relativistic glory slowed down to a halt for the next ten minutes as Luna and Miles exchanged witty blows in a Quidditch debate that lost Gaara’s interest after the third syllable. It was at that ten minute marker that the gods took mercy and the Malfoy seniors told Gaara to take the accumulated guests onwards into the house and to the ballroom. Lacking any means to politely beckon the guests to follow him, Narcissa did the patronising thing and did it for him.

 

“Pardon me, ladies and gentlemen, our young guest, Gaara, would like to show you to the ballroom. If you please follow him.”

 

At least she hadn’t made mention of his disability, though doubtlessly that had been brought up in whispers earlier in the evening. He was a curious addition to the event, like a dancing bear invited in to entertain guests.

 

The walk from the entry hall to the ball room was not a long one and could easily have been left to the guests to make on their own steam, but Gaara figured this was just one of those incomprehensible expectations under the same parachute of ‘etiquette’ that disallowed and obliged a myriad of bizarre acts and behaviours. He knew to just go with it and save himself the headache of hitting his head against a brick wall, otherwise known as debating ‘good manners.’

 

The ball room was even more opulent than it had looked earlier that evening, now lit by the many chandeliers and filled to the brim with nattering, well-dressed witches and wizards. The mixture of squib and muggle-born servers flitted around and tried to be invisible amongst the people who hated them the most in Britain.

 

Gaara hoped the hors d'oeuvres would gravitate towards him sooner rather than later as he was already peckish and he had been warned that the actual food would be a long time in the coming.

 

As he meandered towards where Draco was introducing two equally snobby witches to one another, Gaara marvelled at those assembled in the room. He realised that it was only in Hogwarts that the Slytherins were easily distinguished by their green colourings. Out in the real world, their true prowess was revealed: blending in. A Slytherins greatest trick, their greatest skill was the camouflage themselves as a Ravenclaw, or a Gryffindor or even a Huffelpuff.

 

It was only a few minutes later that mister and missus Malfoy entered the chamber, and Draco helpfully explained that the time for polite arrivals had passed and anyone that came after this point would be greeted by a squib and would be given a worse table. Draco’s mother was a genius when it came to seating arrangements.

 

Draco said that last fact with a curious sense of pride that Gaara wondered about.

 

Along with the hosts of the evening came the few witches and wizards who had chanced arriving late or not coming at all,including Severus Snape, who Gaara decided he would keep an eye on this evening. If he lost track of his head of house, there was every chance (especially with his luck) that they would run into each other. That was the last thing either on them needed.

 

Gaara hung around Draco for the most part, not needing to say anything and just looking a little bored (which did not look at all out of place amongst these high society people). He was given little regard in conversations, or rather, he was given little regard in the conversations that were directed at Draco or him. It wasn’t simply his narcissism judging by the not-so-subtle stares that pierced the back of his head every few seconds.

 

Draco had, like in so many other areas recently, explained before the party that many people would be curious about him and not only because... (here, Draco had actually paused and blushed, trying to think of a kind way of calling Gaara weird)... of Gaara’s eccentricities but also because it was highly irregular for a family like the Malfoys to invite guests to stay. Especially those without extensive and illustrious lineages behind them.

 

Still, if Draco was an expert on high society matters, Gaara was an expert at ignoring ill-concealed stares.

 

It was that very same ignorance that blinded Gaara to one person in particular who was failing spectacularly to hide his interest in the red-head. Fudge had, of course, been aware that one of the reasons of the sleepless nights of late would also be in attendance at the annual Malfoy shindig, and so he had searched the crowds as soon as he arrived for him.

 

He was certainly less... imposing than he might have been lead to believe, though those eyes of his were as terrifying as all of the reports on the boy had suggested. The underwhelming nature of Gaara’s stature and appearance seemed to be a consensus in this world. Gaara liked to believe that the people in his world had feared him as much for his impressive physical presence as his mountainous body count.

 

Everyone takes pride in something.

 

Fudge had been advised by Morbidus, who was taking the lead on this ‘potential issue’, not to interact or approach Gaara in any way this evening. Doing so would complicate any future plans inexorably, so of course Fudge went over at the first opportunity to take the boy’s measure.

 

The prematurely aging life-long politician was still holding out hope, deep down, this was in fact just a boy and the mysteries surrounding him would amount to no threat. He was many things, most of which might not endear him to the enlightened voter, but he was not the sort of man who took pleasure or joy in planning the persecution and defeat of children.

 

He may be ineffectual (according to _some_ ), but he was no monster!

 

Of course, it would be questionable for someone of his extremely important station to brazenly approach and introduce himself to a pair or relative unknowns, children even. Gaara was (to the unknowing masses) a complete nobody, and the less said about the spawn of that insane Lovegood writer the better. It was one thing when a magazine called him a fool or a liar, at least those he could reasonably deny, but when he was accused of being two dwarves pretending to be a full sized man so that he could steal the toupees of Wizagmot officials, he had not recourse. If he tried denying _that_ , he would look the fool regardless.

 

It was just luck that, in this situation, the problem turned into the solution as Luna  spotted the Minister of Magic close by and dragged Gaara over. She introduced herself, and when Gaara made no move to do the same, she introduced him too.

 

“Good evening, Miss Lovegood, and Mister Gaara. I’ve read many of your father’s... articles. They were very interesting.” Fudge said, trying inconspicuously not to look into either of the terrifying teenagers’ eyes. Well, Luna was more off-putting than actually scary to look at. She was scary in the manner that a complex tome or a great height might be.

 

Not that he would ever admit such a feeling.

 

“Thank you, Minister. I’m glad that rumour that you can’t read turned out to be false. Illiteracy is a terrible thing.” Luna was entirely oblivious to Fudge’s anger at her statement. The man clearly didn’t know that Luna was incapable of the complex malice that would have predicated her having been mocking him.

 

She was honestly glad...

 

Gaara wondered if any prose written about Luna would include an inordinate number of elipses.

 

“And Gaara, I’ve heard so much about you; it’s not every day that Hogwarts takes in an exchange student. I also heard that you were a foreigner, is that true?” Luna had seen something shiny and wandered away from the conversation, Gaara would track her down in a few minutes to make sure she was okay.

 

‘You’ve heard a lot.’

 

“My, I almost hadn’t believed the stories about your magical abilities, they really are quite remarkable.” Fudge stared at the sand freely floating its formless state, knowing that there was no magical artefact or wand at work here and that it was entirely Gaara’s power.

 

“I am glad the Malfoys have been so hospitable in your time here. I work very closely with Lucius at the Minsitry and I know that he is a good person.” Both of the conversational partners wondered if the other know how false that statement was.

 

‘The people of this country are very kind.’

 

“Where are you from originally, if you don’t mind my asking?”

 

‘A country far away, hidden from most. It isn’t a very kind or forgiving place.’

 

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

 

‘War can be hard on people, and that turns them hard.’

 

“...Yes, I suppose it does.” Cornelius didn’t know what to make of that. The mention of war, even the word itself, sent shivers down his spine. Could that be the truth, the hidden fact that would fill in the blanks of this mysterious boy? A three-letter word that accounted for so much.

 

“So, how did you come to find yourself in Britain? So many fine magical countries to choose from, after all. Do you perhaps have family here, or you knew someone in the country beforehand?”

 

‘I wanted to travel and England seemed like a fitting choice. It’s very different from my home, but there is a lot here that I have come to appreciate.’

 

“And your parents?” It was hardly normal for a boy, not even at his majority, to travel to distant countries and spend at least a school year there; not without a good reason, it wasn’t.

 

‘I am an orphan.’ Gaara didn’t usually hold much of an emotional inflection on his face as he spoke, and ‘talking’ about his dead parents was not different. He hated his father and the less said about his non-existent relationship with his mother the better, but he didn’t particularly feel anything when discussing their deaths. It was natural to him.

 

“I am sorry to hear that,” Fudge noticed the Malfoy boy coming towards them. From what Morbidus had told him, Draco was already quite close to Gaara and knew his opportunity was at an end. “And I didn’t mean to give you the third-degree. You see, the Ministry seems to have lost their records from when you entered the country and it seemed like a perfect opportunity to perform the routine checks myself. Besides, it was a pleasure to meet you.”

 

With Draco almost to them, Fudge nodded his head one final time and strolled away to the closest circle that was of high-enough class to host him.

 

“What did the Minister want with you?” Draco greeted Gaara.

 

Gaara shrugged a little and turned towards where he had seen someone carrying trays of little morsels. Narcissa had insisted that none of them eat lunch as it would not do to be bloated before the party. Whatever that meant.

 

He was intercepted by the woman herself and had to watch the last trays leave the room while Narcissa subtly fussed over both his and Draco’s hairs and robes. Draco’s hair was never out of place to begin with (ever) and Gaara’s was a lost cause. Draco knew to stay still until the henpecking was finished, as there was nothing he could do to expedite it, but Gaara squirmed relentlessly under the all-too familiar attention. Draco’s mother reminded him far too much of his sister.

 

Mrs Malfoy walked the two boys around the crowds until they came upon Luna and her father, spiritedly debating one thing or another with a few other guests. Narcissa held her breath until the other people, all much more important than Xenophillius Lovegood, began to laugh along with him. She deposited Gaara there and dragged Draco back towards the head table where the Minster, her husband and a few other choice individuals were preparing to be seated for dinner.

 

Gaara, despite being a personal guest of the Malfoy family, was a nobody and was relegated to sitting with the other nobodies, aka everyone that Draco had whimsically invited. They were close to the back of the hall and would likely not draw much attention there.

 

Everyone took their sweet time in moving towards their assigned seats, and when everyone was sat at the dozens upon dozens of round tables, Lucius stood up and began the first of his many toasts and speeches of the meal. It was for this very eventuality that Gaara had surreptitiously snuck in a small book inside his robes. He had been afraid that Narcissa might notice, but from the look on her face when she spotted him with the book in his hands, he had to guess she would not have permitted it had she known.

 

Luckily her hands were tied and she could do nothing to confiscate his distraction for now. Draco had paled and then stifled a wry smile at the sight.

 

The food was good, but Gaara would have settled for mission rations if they had come sooner.

 

When everyone had finished, and Gaara was sure he could go a few days without interacting with anyone, the party goers moved back on the hall floor and some began to dance.

 

Gaara honestly found it hilarious that Draco was kept so busy by the eligible bachelorettes vying for his attention. He had had no idea that Draco was such a snappy dancer.

 

Luna eventually asked him to dance but didn’t look all that upset when he flatly turned her down. He had glibly told her ‘maybe next time I’m at a dance.’

 

He wouldn’t be here this time next year, with any luck, and he surely wouldn’t come to one of these parties again if he had any say in it.

 

Gaara was soon treated to the sight of Slytherins getting drunk. The high society members left when it was polite to do so, but the slightly less reserved men and women took their chance to let loose and have a good time, and even the Malfoys (stone sobre, of course) looked to be enjoying themselves a little.

 

Draco looked like he was happy when he finally got a chance to stop dancing and have a rest. He gravitated towards Gaara at his first break and counted on Gaara’s patented exclusion zone to keep any further suitors at bay.

 

The night wore on and soon the departing guests snowballed and everyone had left, except for a couple of stragglers. Luna had be very thankful to the Malfoys and to Gaara (though he had tried to explain that it wasn’t right to thank him as it wasn’t his party and he had no part in planning it), before she helped her totally plastered father into the floo. The other moderates that Draco had invited were similarly thankful, but in a much more respectable and reserved fashion.

 

The time came that there were only two families still keeping the hosts and Gaara from settling down for the night. The Crabbe and Goyles had clearly planned to stay behind after everyone else, in order to get Lucius alone and continue to try and re-endear themselves to him.

 

Such desperation was hardly befitting Purebloods and Death Eaters, but without the Malfoy family’s close backing, both the Crabbes and Goyles had little hope of staying above the Weasley/poverty line. The only reason that Lucius had already invested so much of his time and so many of his resources in the useless lot was because he had needed underlings. He had cut them off as a warning and a punishment for their sons’ actions, but he had found his burdens lightened without them around. Now he had absolutely no need of either family, and he was not afraid to let them know it.

 

Sadly, decorum would never allow him to kick out guests that he had personally invited.

 

It was after ten minutes of casually suggesting that the party was over that Gaara proved his utility to the Malfoy family. Both the Crabbes and Goyles had tried to keep most of the party goers between them and Gaara the entire evening, and now that there were no more witches and wizards to acts as barriers, they ‘subtly’ tried to place the Malfoys between them and Gaara, who was sedately sitting at one of the nearby tables, suffering from the fatigue associated with intense boredom.

 

It was just about when Crabbe snior started off about his latest business venture, and dropping conspicuous hints about needing a financial backer, that Gaara had had enough. He slid out one of his kunai loudly and began to sharpen it on his small battlefield whetstone. Of course, none of his knives needed sharpening, Kankuro’s weapons (which he often borrowed) could stay sharp with months of use. And the kunai he had borrowed before he left had hardly seen any use at all.

 

But none could deny the intimidating effect the sound of metal scraping against the grinding stone had on the quiet audience. The Crabbes and Goyles were undeniably scared and their sons broke into cold sweats.

 

Narcissa had to wrestle the smile off of her face when the heads of both of the detestable families fought to make their pitiful excuses and all but run from the ballroom and back to the floo before the other.

 

Draco had expected Gaara to have disappeared whilst they watched the other flee, but when he turned back to him, he had just return the kunai and its sharpening stone to his hidden pouchand looked up at Narcissa.

 

“You may go now. Thank you for behaving yourself tonight, Gaara.” She showed him a rare smile and he... didn’t have an expression on his face.

 

Faster than Draco could blink, Gaara had disappeared from the ballroom, probably to soothe his raging headache. The Malfoys also decided to turn in for the night, albeit at a much slower pace. They left the mess for the squibs and muggleborns to clean up. They should have the place spotless by the morning.

 

If they didn’t, Lucius would be having words with their supervisor, or destroying their reputation so that they would never get hired again.

 

Draco went upstairs and tried to sleep away his aching muscles and Gaara sat in the attic, the hiding place he had been using regularly since none of the Malfoys had thought to look for him there even once. It was nice and quiet and reminded him of one of his early homes after Yashamaru’s death. Only it had fewer rats.

 

Meanwhile, Lucius and Narcissa shared a drink in the drawing room and began to discuss the night as they always had after each and every event that they had hosted since they married. Who had been talking to whom, and salacious gossip to be spread or quashed, any influential contacts made or strengthened, anything of note that had happened that evening.

 

Lucius was the member of the Wizagmot, the politician, the Death Eater, but he was by no means the only tactician in their relationship. They had decided long ago the division of their roles and were the perfect couple for it. When they had talked over any and all of the possible ramifications of the evening’s events, Narcissa stood and gave her husband a kiss on the cheek and retired for the night.

 

All the while, Lucius sweated over what hadn’t been brave enough to tell his beloved wife: that the Minister had been positively frosty towards him during the party, and work had been little better. Somehow, he had lost Cornelius’ hard won confidence.

 

He poured himself a second drink.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

One night, a couple of days following the Malfoy Christmas Part, Lucius pulled Gaara aside after dinner to have a chat. Gaara had scarcely stood in Lucius’ personal study since arriving, and only ever when accompanied by Draco AND either of the Malfoy parents. He didn’t know whether they thought he would steal or break something, but he had respected the room’s sanctity and stayed away except when called for or when he wanted to read one of the books in there.

 

“Have a seat, Gaara.” Lucius sat himself behind his desk and waited patiently as Gaara took his sweet time in settling himself down. “We need to talk. We both know that there is more to you than meets the eye. In fact, I imagine most people that meet you can probably see that you are...” Lucius paused, “Different, but none of them have had the nerve or perhaps they just haven’t had the motivation to ask you to your face, exactly what you are.”

 

Gaara knew that this was not just another meeting with an adult of this world that saw him as a child, this man knew that he was as much an adult as anyone. Such was the understanding of two men who had shed masses of blood for one reason or another.

 

“But that isn’t what I need to ask you tonight. Frankly, whatever, whoever you are, you are of use to me as long as you are loyal to my son. Anything more than that is irrelevant, for the moment.” Lucius paused again, he was clearly struggling with treating a child as a conversational equal, or perhaps he was just struggling with the subject matter, whatever it was.

 

“You know of our history, the British Wizarding War, I presume?” Gaara nodded, “And I assume that you know roughly what part I played in it.” The time for legal denials and ambiguities has passed. “I need to know, if war starts again, and I and my family take our side, where will you stand, Gaara?”

 

When no answer was forthcoming, he continued, “The Dark Lord is generous to his loyal followers, more than anyone on the outside can understand, he could grant your greatest wishes. But if you face him on the wrong side, his wrath is without measure. He will rain vengeance down on anyone who does not swear fealty to him. Do you understand what I am saying Gaara? You don’t need to give your answer now, or even give it to me. The time will come when the question is asked by Him, and then you will have to be sure who you will stand beside when this world changes.”

 

Gaara made absolutely no move to respond and maintained the tense standoff with his formidable stare. Lucius eventually sighed and thanked Gaara for his time. Gaara stood and left the home office, casting one last look back at Lucius but still offering no confirmation nor condemnation towards the ultimatum he had just been given.

 

Frankly, Lucius was stumped by the reaction. Gaara probably wanted time to consider the offer, or else he didn’t want to choose a side at the moment and wished to abstain, though that would only suffice until it all began in earnest. No one was allowed to sit outside of the coming war, especially someone so closely connected to his son. He would need to keep an eye on those two, even more so now.

 

For ten years he had had peace. No war, no Dark Lord or Boy-Who-Lived, no mysterious trouble-making teenagers; just his family and his simple ambitions. Things were going to change, he had always believed that was the right way, but it would be far from easy when that shift came.

 

All the while, Gaara worried. He had hoped something like this wouldn’t happen, as the simple act of being asked to join the war (on either side) disallowed him from ignoring it entirely. Like it or not, he was now involved, all that remained was that he pick a side, or flee. Obviously the latter was preferable, but by no means was it assured.

 

Either way, he did not intend to become a weapon for yet another war. But he did have people to protect here...

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

 Draco had never before woken up before Gaara on one of the nights that Gaara had decided to sleep, and Christmas morning was no exception, but Draco did barge into the guest room hours before he might otherwise have. It was, in fact, only an hour after Gaara himself had awoken and the sun would not rise for a while yet.

 

“Merry Christmas, Gaara.” Draco announced by way of greeting, and his exuberance earned him the customary morning nod for his troubles. Despite the saying, the excitement was not contagious.

 

Gaara was quite content to finish the book he was reading before he indulged whatever crazy traditions were encompassed in this ‘Christmas’ hassle. He didn’t see why a holiday would mean that Draco, usually something of a sloth, would get up early and then expect Gaara to join him in celebrating whatever Christmas was all about.

 

Sadly, this childish turn that Draco had taken also meant that he wouldn’t take ‘no’ for an answer and practically dragged Gaara out of the guest wing and up to the freezing owlery.

 

So post was something to do with Christmas?

 

He was a little surprised to find the small pile of brightly coloured boxes sitting on a small table in the centre of the chamber. An owl flew in and dropped another disproportionately large present onto the table before flying straight back out.

 

“Families usually hire postal owls for Christmas when they have to send lots of presents. Unless they’re really poor, then I suppose they just send out their own owls to each family, but that overworks the owl. Although, if they were really poor, they probably wouldn’t be able to send out too many presents.” Draco pondered as picked up one of the presents and invited Gaara to find his own name on one of them and take it too.

 

“Mother and Father always said I was allowed to open one of my presents in the morning, but since you’re here I don’t see why you can’t too. The rest will be taken down to the drawing room later on.”

 

They returned to Draco’s bedroom and began to unwrap their presents, Gaara trying studiously to follow his freind’s lead. If he was going to be a part of this Christmas thing, he was going to try and do it right. For instance, from the disgusted look the platinum-blond shot at him, the neat and tidy method of unwrapping his present was not appropriate.

 

Draco had received something called a ‘Rememberall’ from a distant relation, but he didn’t seem too happy about the gift. Apparently, judging by the perfectly clear orb, he had no trouble remembering an unpleasant memory associated with it.

 

Gaara had received a pair of socks from Dumbledore. Draco snarled and said that the ‘old coot’ sent socks to all of the orphaned students. Gaara thought it was a kind enough gesture, and he was mature enough to appreciate that new socks were indeed a comfortable luxury. He was surprised to be getting gifts at all.

 

They lounged around for a little while, the sun having yet to rise, and Gaara even goaded Draco into a game of Wizard’s Chess. Draco had grown bored of chess with Gaara because of the ease with which the red-head beat him every time they played. If it weren’t for Gaara’s ineptitude with magic or his total obliviousness in most social situations, Draco didn’t think his ego would survive his friendship with Gaara.

 

Sooner than Gaara had thought, Draco giddily declared that it was now time for them to go downstairs. Furthering his surprise, Gaara saw that Lucius and Narcissa were already awake and sitting in the family room. Both sipping large cups of coffee.

 

“Merry Christmas Mother, merry Christmas Father.” Draco said. He was acting more like a child than Gaara had ever seen him; it was a relief to know that he wasn’t a snake to the core.

 

“Merry Christmas, Draco.” Lucius drawled, taking another swig of his coffee. Apparently the adults in the room, though resigned to it, were still fighting to remain composed this early in the morning.

 

“Merry Christmas, sweetheart. And merry Christmas to you too, Gaara.” Narcissa said, smiling in between yawns.

 

This world really needed a Rock Lee to liven them up. He would happily give them his world’s after he had returned...

 

Gaara’s handful of sand that he kept on his person rose up, ‘Merry Christmas.’ He sat on the sofa with Draco, noting that his friends probably would have sat on the floor if the Malfoy’s didn’t have company.

 

As they sat in comfortable silence, each of them enjoying their hot beverage (Draco and Gaara had been given a hot chocolate each instead of coffee (despite Gaara’s vehement disavowal of the association of his age with his apparent sweet-toothed tastes)), an owl swooped in through the door.

 

Gaara was the only one who seemed to noticed the owl until it had landed within arm’s length of Narcissa, at which point Lucius and Draco started to look uncomfortable. The matronly witch had a sad smile on her face when she retrieved the small envelope clutched in the owl’s talons and Gaara wondered what part of the Christmas ritual this was.

 

As far as he knew, all of the post overnight and in the morning had been left up in the owlery to be brought down a little later by the hired help, so it was curious that a letter had been brought straight to the family. More so, that it was taken directly to Narcissa rather than the head of the household who had received everyone other piece of mail since he had been there.

 

Without any further ado, she carefully opened the envelope (using a handy, jewel-encrusted, silver letter opener)and pulled out the single sheaf of parchment.

 

He would have expected, with the generally grim demeanour around the room, that this must have been some sort of business missive, but he was also given to understand that Christmas was a day where absolutely no business was performed. Unexpectedly, Narcissa cleared her throat and began to read it aloud:

 

‘ _Hello Cissy, Draco and Lucius,_

_Thank you for the chocolates. You always did have the best taste of us. Azkaban is cold. I ate a bug, but don’t tell anyone. Apparently our blood-traitor cousin escaped. Him rotting here amongst us has been the only entertainment we’ve had for years! I’m glad Draco is well and that he is already drawing in followers. We need all of the people we can get when the Dark Lord rises again. There’s a dementor coming so I’ll stop writing._

_Love,_

_Bella._

_P.s. Lucius has stupid hair._ ’

 

Narcissa tried not to look heartbroken at her little sister’s fragmented, almost illegible letter. Bellatrix has always had the most beautiful penmanship when they were children together. 

 

Inmates in Azkaban were allowed one piece of mail a year and thanks to Lucius’ connections, Narcissa was able to send a little bit of chocolate with her missive. Once every three years, for those unfortunate enough to have to stay any longer than that, inmates were also entitled to one visitation. Narcissa always went alone when the time came around, after she had tried to take Draco one year.

 

It hadn’t been the gloomy castle, the misty island, or the lingering sensation of the dementors corralled away from the visitors that gave Draco nightmares for weeks afterwards. It had been the sight of his aunt, of whom he had seen many pictures back when she was still sane, beautiful and able to smile; she was a different woman after her years in Azkaban’s highest tower and he had spent the entire visit clinging to his mother and begging to go home.

 

At least her sense of humour hadn’t been robbed from her entirely, judging by her post script. Bella had never like Lucius and she had taken every chance to belittle him. Some things would never change.

 

“Aunt Bellatrix is in Azkaban because she fought for the Dark Lord in the war. She refused to deny him at her trial so she didn’t get away with it.” Draco whispered to Gaara as Narcissa reigned in her emotions and slid the parchment onto the side table to be filed away later on.

 

“Enough maudlin emotions. Today is for jollity. Lucius, I think the boys have waited long enough to open their presents, don’t you.”

 

“I suppose there’s no sense in waiting, is there.” Lucius was still a little miffed about that hair comment.

 

Draco all but dived towards the piles in front of them and picked up the nearest to him and distractedly sat back into his plush seat the brightly wrapped box in his lap. With a visible second thought, Draco glanced over at Gaara and seemed to want him to do something and it occurred to him that he was expected to join in and take a present too.

 

A quick glance to the pile closest to Draco told him that they were all addressed to the platinum blond, whereas the smaller pile closer to his seat was for him. It disturbed him to know that whoever had arranged the gifts had somehow known that he would sit where he had. Unless they had simply known that Draco would instinctively take the seat with the biggest pile of gifts.

 

They each opened their gifts, Draco following Gaara’s lead in carefully peeling the paper off now that they were being observed by the eagle-eyed Malfoy adults.

 

And so went the better part of the morning. They both started with the heaps of gifts that had been sent in the days prior and that very morning, many of which had only come for Gaara after people had seen him as the guest of the Malfoys’ at their annual party.

 

Both of the boys received a slew of trinkets and expensive looking toys from various strangers, as well as a few choice books and some clothes. Of course, Draco’s gifts were almost uniformly more lavish and fancy, but that suited Gaara’s tastes perfectly. Most of the people he didn’t know, and they had sent things he didn’t really want. It was a peculiarly wasteful custom, he believed, but it did seem to make Draco very happy.

 

When the mountains of gifts had been unwrapped and restacked after being conscientiously appreciated, then came the more personal gifts that had been held back by the Malfoys. Draco, practically twitching with anticipation, insisted that Gaara open his gift first.

 

He was presented with a heavy box which he unwrapped as quickly as his meticulous nature would allow, and found a dark wooden case, inside of which rested an ornate and beautiful silver dagger. He took it out of the box and admired the jewel-encrusted hilt and the even weighting. It was a terribly impractical weapon, he could only imagine the blisters that would form if one were to try wielding such a bumpy handle in battle, but even still he admired its beautiful craftsmanship.  

 

It was a nice, semi-thoughtful gift but, judging but the hopeful looks that Draco kept shooting at his mother and the quiet satisfaction she kept shooting back, Gaara guessed that the Malfoy matriarch probably had a rather prominent role in the selection of this gift.

 

As if by an afterthought, Draco also passed him a wrapped piece of cloth, by the feel of it, and hastily told Gaara that he had almost forgot that he had gotten him another gift as well. The surprised looks on the Malfoy parents’ faces told Gaara that Draco had most likely not asked (begged) his mother for help with this particular gift, and the reason became apparent.

 

A simple winter cloak was not a proper gift to give to a _friend_ , it might imply that the individual was too poor to buy their own (which, strictly speaking, was true).

 

“I know you already have a cloak, but I thought you might like one that has an inbuilt heating charm, since you’re always cold.” Draco spoke flippantly, obviously not caring much for the (relatively speaking) inexpensive present nearly as much as his friend’s reaction towards the sentiment behind it.

 

‘Thank you, Draco.’ Gaara smiled as he looked down at his favourite gift so far.

 

Gaara would need to be careful; if his friend continued being so thoughtful and kind, he might actually end up hugging him or some other such distasteful act of emotion.

 

Lucius and Narcissa also had their own small pile of gifts, which Draco explained were just the ones they were willing to be seen to accept, the rest were either thrown away or returned to the senders. The results amounted to a handful of vastly wealthy witches and wizards and what was left of Voldemort’s inner circle (though the last part was not explicitly said in front of Gaara).

 

A late arrival came just as Lucius was exclaiming sardonically to Narcissa how ‘unexpectedly generous the Crabbes and Goyles have been this year’ before setting the last gift down absentmindedly. The owl tapped at the lead paned window impatiently, clearly an owl for hire not best pleased with being sent out in the dead of winter on such a long delivery.

 

“Look at that;” Lucius practically snarled in disgust, “to send a rental owl to deliver a Christmas gift, and to do so late!” He took out his wand and Gaara thought for a moment that he might hex the poor frost-bitten bird, but instead the window popped open briefly to allow the bird entry.

 

In its icy talons, it clutched a box just the right size to hold a sensible pair of shoes, or so Gaara thought as he got up from his plush seat and walked over to the fire to retrieve it. Lucius seemed further upset by this delivery-bird’s show of contempt, to have the client (or more likely the guest of a client) come to it rather than presenting the delivery to the intended recipient. Surely none of his contacts would be so crass!

 

“Gaara, dear, give that box to Lucius without opening, would you,” Narcissa said with well-veiled urgency. Gaara did so, understanding that there might be a trap of some sort on or in the parcel. It was a great disadvantage to be so unaware of the possibilities and potential for combat and espionage in magic. He might need to spend some of his research time actually looking into other uses for magic and not just his usual search for a way home.

 

Lucius performed a series of meaningless, to Gaara, movements with his wand and then, when nothing seemed to happen, he huffed and handed the parcel over to Narcissa with a nod.

 

“Well, let’s just see who... oh,” Narcissa said while looking at the addressee on the box, “It says it’s for Gaara and Draco.”

 

“Surely not just for the boys.” Lucius exclaimed, leaning over to get a look as well. Not only did it only refer to the boys, making no mention of he and his wife, but it even put Gaara’s name before their own son’s.

 

The atmosphere, previously warm and congenial (as much as the Malfoy’s could muster) turned a tad awkward as Lucius handed off the gift to Gaara again and sat back to watch him open it on behalf of Draco and he. They expected it to be from some Mudblood acquaintance of Gaara’s who did not understand how insulting their gift had been (let alone their existence).

 

Lucius had to bite back his expression of rage when Gaara tore off the brown packaging paper and found two brightly wrapped presents with little cards tied on, one for each boy and both apparently from Professor Remus Lupin. It wasn’t some muggleborn who was unaware of proper manners, it was the mongrel teaching his child who knew exactly how he was insulting he and his wife.

 

Leave it one of _those_ four to use something as simple as a gift as a chance to score points. Bloody Marauders!

 

Still, better the diseased commoner than any of the others. Though, at least that scum Pettigrew had had the good sense to stay away since his apparent death those years ago, and Black wasn’t in any position to be sending gifts to anyone at the moment.

 

Then there was Potter...

 

Lucius’ good mood restored, he watched his son and his son’s friend open their last gifts with curiosity. After all, that Lupin was as poor as one would expect of a man who had never been able to hold down a steady job in his life (for good reason). Lucius couldn’t imagine how or why he was buying Christmas presents for two amongst many students he had only met earlier that year.

 

In Draco’s box were some ‘Berty Bott’s Every Flavour Beans’ and a new and rather unheard of book detailing the advances in muggle society and technology over the past two hundred years. Both things guaranteed to bother mister and missus pureblood. Plebeian sweets and proscribed literature.

 

They would have Draco give them the book later, in private, otherwise it might give Gaara the wrong impression about the family. They wouldn’t mind if he got the idea that they were snobs or blood purists, since they proudly were, but they would not be seen to be rude.

 

They didn’t hold out hope that they would be able to pry those sweets from their son’s clutches any time soon, so they would let that one slide for now. Narcissa personally wondered what Lupin might have gotten Gaara, and whether or not it would simply be another slap in the face for Lucius.

 

Gaara’s box was smaller than Draco’s, fitting snugly in the palm of his ~~dainty~~ hand, and inside there was a small, red, velvet bag tied with golden string. Gaara poked it open with his index finger and was surprised when his probing finger didn’t feel the bottom of the bag and his palm, but instead kept on going in.

 

His entire arm fit inside of the tiny bag with ease, and Gaara guessed he could fit a horse in his new personal storage and still have room for all of his other worldly possessions.

 

“Oh, that’s a very practical gift for your professor to buy you.” Narcissa said, “I wonder, is he buying gifts for all of his students this year? I imagine that would likely be quite the expense if they are all as lavish as your own. I would wager it would put a dent in _our_ expenses to buy so many presents.”

 

“I think it’s because Professor Lupin has been giving Gaara extra lessons after school to help him catch up.” Draco said, already popping a few beans into his mouth. He got lucky this time: all food flavours.

 

“He probably got me one as well so I wouldn’t feel left out, or some such thing.” Draco finished, trying to offer a reluctant Gaara a red jelly bean.

 

“Oh yes, I seem to remember you mentioning something Gaara having a tutor.” Lucius said, “I suppose even a reprobate like Lupin might have his uses.” He seemed loathe to admit even this small concession in his judgment of the man.

 

The foursome spent a little while longer examining and appreciating their gifts before Gaara excused himself from the room. Instead of continuing on to one of the bathrooms on this floor, Gaara stopped outside of the door and pulled the little bag back out of his pocket. He had felt something inside earlier, but an intuition told him to wait until he was alone to see what it was.

 

He didn’t know what to say when he pulled out what was obviously a broom wrapped in brown packing paper, which made the profanity, that he accidentally uttered, something of a surprise. As luck would have it, his mute state worked in his favour this time.

 

A moment of epiphany struck and Gaara pulled the wizarding toy out of his bag and tore of the note attached. He shoved the paper in his pocket quickly and let himself back into the drawing room in time to see Draco get a scolding from his mother for pulling a face after he had tasted a particularly unpleasant jelly bean.

 

“What do you have there, behind you, Gaara?” Lucius asked, hiding his grimace at his son’s childish antics.

 

‘A Christmas present for Draco.’ Gaara’s speaking-sand moved without his gesture or notice.

 

Pulling his face into something more heartfelt, he said “But Gaara, I said you didn’t need to worry about getting any presents this year.” The ‘because you don’t have any money’ was left unsaid.

 

Not one for mincing words, or saying them, Gaara walked forwards and thrust the recycled present at Draco. ‘I hope it is a good one.’ His sand spelled out as Draco took the gift.

 

Draco had a nervous smile on his face as he accepted the gift, beyond grateful for the gesture alone, but the reality was that his dirt poor friend had most likely scrounged up a cheap and useless second hand broom and Draco would have to try and pretend that it wasn’t a piece of junk. He might even be obligated to fly it once or twice in front of Gaara as thanks.

 

It would surely be awkward when his father bought him the new Nimbus 2003 that had just been released, which was over two times as...

 

He had a Firebolt.

 

He had a Firebolt.

 

Gaara had given Draco a Firebolt.

 

Gaara had given him a Firebolt!?

 

Draco stared uncomprehendingly at both his hopelessly stoic best friend and his brand-new, not-even-released-to-the-public broom; he didn’t know whether to kiss his friend or his beautiful new broom, but after assessing which was least likely to kill him afterwards, he kissed his broom.

 

“How- How on Earth did you get this broom? This broom isn’t even on the shelves yet!”

 

If Gaara had known the fuss this would cause, he would have gone with his first instinct and burnt the thing.

 

“Is that a Firebolt?” For the first time that morning, Lucius seemed genuinely interested in proceedings.

 

“Really, Gaara, where on Earth did you find this broom? He could you afford it?” Draco was asking entirely in disbelief as no one present believed for a second that he wanted to give his new broom up. Gaara could have told them that he snatched it out of the hands of the Minister for Magic and Draco would be asking for his father’s lawyer.

 

‘Horses do not like you looking in their mouths.’ Gaara sand sagely wrote out.

 

“What?” Draco said, trying to decipher the meaning behind that sentence.

 

“Draco, I think he means ‘you shouldn’t look a gift-horse in the mouth.’” Narcissa supplied, smiling despite herself. It really was a very generous and thoughtful gifts for Gaara to give, even she also wanted to know where it had come from.

 

Gaara blinked at hearing the proper saying, but he still didn’t understand what it actually referred to.

 

Narcissa went on to say, once Draco had momentarily stopped rubbing his cheek against his new broom, that if the boys were good they could go out and play with the broom for a little while after lunch. Of course they would both be bundled up with as many heavy fleece items clothing that the Malfoys possessed. Narcissa wasn’t about to see her precious son (and Gaara) out in this biting cold without the proper protection.

 

Due to his less than voluble nature, it escaped Draco’s and Narcissa’s notice that Gaara was frowning even more prominently than he usually did. Lucius did, however, happen to notice, but his quirked brow was as far as he was willing to acknowledge it. After all, his entire schooling experience, from his first hour in Hogwarts, had taught him to take note of any weaknesses he observed and exploit them at the proper moment.

 

Granted, his son’s best friend’s immense dislike (fear?) of flying or brooms wasn’t the most useful piece of information, but you didn’t get to be where he was by ignoring anything you saw or heard.

 

And so the morning and day went in the Malfoy ~~home~~ house manor: Draco indulging every neglected childish, whimsical bone in his otherwise stoic, noble nature; and Gaara being dragged kicking and screaming along for the ride, trying to convince himself that he hated every moment. All the while the Malfoy parents enjoyed, in their own way, both the day and their son’s seldom allowed exuberance.

 

In the evening, the boys were called to dinner and found what Gaara could only describe as a feast fit for a gluttonous king. There was enough food to feed an entire clan of hungry ninja, and instead it sat in front of three skinny wizards and one ninja who had never found any real or particular satisfaction from eating.

 

They ate largely in silence, as they had in the majority of their meals since Gaara arrived, but eventually the red-head sighed and scrunched up his eyebrows and commanded his sand.

 

‘I have to leave tomorrow morning.’

 

He had been putting off telling Draco this since he had arrived, and had considered just disappearing once or twice. He had come to the conclusion that Draco would either take that incredibly personally, or else he would pay lots of people to go looking for him.

 

Narcissa was the first to notice the silent message hovering in the air when she saw Gaara had stopped eating, and it caused her to put down her fork. Lucius noticed his wife had paused at the other end of the table, ever vigilant of when she wanted to say something. Narcissa was not known to speak without reason or meaning unless they were at a social function.

 

Finally Draco noticed that everyone had stilled and regular clinks of the silverware had stopped. Looking up, he performed a double take when he skimmed Gaara’s message, and had to read it a third time for the message to sink in.

 

It was devastating to see that his friend wanted to leave before the end of the holiday break. Having Gaara here with him had been better than he could have imagined, even if the acerbic boy had spent most of his time reading or exercising. Growing up, the only times he could have company his own age were when his parents organised ‘play dates’ with other suitably prestigious family’s children.

 

These meeting had always been political negotiations so his actions and movements had to be controlled or restricted so as to not look bad in front of important contacts. It wasn’t like he couldn’t have _any_ fun, but it had always been a burden on his mind that his playing or socialising could adversely affect his family.

 

Which his parents had always stressed was paramount.

 

But having Gaara around was what Draco imagined having a brother was like. No pretences or niceties, simply friendship and occasional conflict (like over morning training or Quidditch practice.) And he had thought that Gaara had enjoyed it as well, in his own scowling way.

 

“Might I ask why the change of plans, Gaara?” Narcissa broke the silence, affecting his practiced smile and putting his cutlery down on his plate in the proper positions.

 

“Yes, I’m curious to know what has changed and why the last minute notice.” Lucius piped up, not appreciating the lack of courtesy from the urchin he had seen fit to allow into his home. This was why he continued to rally in favour of etiquette lessons at Hogwarts, not matter how outdated or ‘elitist’ Albus insisted they would be. Socialist nuisance. 

 

‘Dumbledore has called me back for testing in a few days.’ He wouldn’t have minded a little more of the roasted goose he had been slowly eating, but it seemed like the meal was over. ‘He said he wanted to check my progress as a transfer.’

 

“What? Now?” Draco blurted out.

 

‘I will be making my own way back to the school, seeing more of this country.’

 

“Do you mean to say that you will be walking all the way to Scotland from here?” Lucius arched his eyebrow.

 

‘I will fly as far as I can. It will take a couple of days.’

 

“You’ll fly?” Narcissa shared the surprise of everyone else at the table.

 

“But you hate flying, and you don’t even have a broom.” Draco said, hoping he might be able to convince Gaara to stick around for another day or two before taking a Portkey just for the test. His father would certainly pay for it if he asked hard enough.

 

‘I will use my sand. I have travelled further before, it shouldn’t be a problem.’

 

“Oh, right. Your sand.” Draco worked to keep his face blank.

 

“Well, I suppose if there is nothing we can do to persuade you to stay a little longer and take a faster route there, that’s that then.” It seemed as if Narcissa was saying it more for her son’s benefit than for Gaara’s.

 

“Trust that old coot to call you up to him with hardly any notice. Still, it is the headmaster’s prerogative and I suppose you are something of a special circumstance.” And also something of a mystery, irritatingly. “Nonetheless, I will certainly be bringing up his latest contemptible display of belligerence at the next school board meeting.” Rather than inconvenienced, Lucius looked like he had been given an especially pleasant Christmas present.

 

‘I am sorry for the lack of notice. I will be departing in the morning.’

 

“I will have the cooks prepare you a little something for your travels, if you would like.” Narcissa said, picking up her knife and fork and resuming her meal.  

 

‘Thank you. That would be much appreciated.’

 

As the adults (somehow including the diminutive Gaara) come to an understanding, Draco brooded quietly and tried not to show his displeasure. He didn’t want to look like a spoilt child whose friend had abandoned.

 

No matter how close that strayed towards the truth.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

“Are you sure you wouldn’t rather take a Portkey, or maybe get someone to Apparate you there?”

 

‘Entirely.’ Gaara remembered his last apparition and it was not a fond memory.

 

“And I’ll see you when I come back after the holidays?”

 

‘I would imagine so, as we share a room.’ Gaara’s wide-eyed innocence made Draco suspect he was not being sarcastic. Typical.

 

“Be careful on your journey, and stay clear of muggles, Gaara. It’s been a pleasure having you.” Narcissa stood close to Lucius, bracing herself against the cold.

 

“Yes, a pleasure. Please do come back.” Lucius said shortly.

 

Gaara nodded, calling the sand the sand out his trusty gourd and mounting it. He was entirely grateful to Draco for his heated cloak. It was going to be a long journey, several hundred miles, and this country really gave new meaning to the ‘dead of winter’.

 

‘Thank you again for your hospitality. I’ll see you at school Draco.’

 

And with those parting words, Gaara flew into the sky and northwards. He was going to miss Draco’s company.

 

Strange.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

As it transpired, Christmas didn’t only come to the Malfoys, but almost everyone else that day.

 

In Little Hagleton, the expansive Weasley family had enjoyed a rare treat in recent years, with their entire family gathering under one roof to celebrate Christmas. It was a welcome coincidence that they had won the lottery allowing them to pay for their children to travel back from Hogwarts the year that there was a terrible murderer on the loose and targeting the school. And the money had even paid for Bill and Charlie to visit as well.

 

As one would expect, it was a truly raucous affair with the brothers all telling the best stories they could think of without their mother hearing. Arthur even joined in for a bit before Molly stormed up and broke them up. Meanwhile Ginny was penning yet another letter to Harry. She was still miffed that she couldn’t send any of her thoughtful missives without her mother’s approval.

 

Something about scaring him off or something.

 

The Granger family Christmas was a smaller event and definitely a quieter one, with just the three of them enacting the perfect middle class festive experience. They woke up, had smoked salmon and opened presents, relaxed for a while before Mrs Granger cooked up supper, and after eating they all went on a walk.

 

After hearing about the murderer on the loose, thanks to the headmaster’s surprisingly open policy with regards to notifying muggle parents about goings-on in the Wizarding world, and after Hermione had been ‘petrified’ last year, they had decided to bring her home and enjoy one of their long neglected intimate family Christmases. Ignorant of this, Hermione was very contented in her home. She had missed sharing the holidays with her parents too.

 

Harry was on his own again, for the first Christmas since he had found his true home here at Hogwarts. He wasn’t the only Gryffindor to stay, he wasn’t even the only boy in his dorm room to stay for the holidays, but without Ron and Hermione, he still felt a little abandoned, despite what he had said to repeatedly reassure Ron and Herm. There was no reason his tragic lack of a home to go back to should affect his friend’s celebrations.

 

Still, it had touched him that the two had tried to refuse their parents’ invitations for his sake, but at Harry’s insistence and their parents’ demands, the two had gone home and left him. Neville was in the same boat, and so they spent the better part of the day together, consoling each other for their shared deficits. Harry didn’t know the particulars of Neville’s situation, he had always found such subjects in poor taste (everyone just seemed to know his naturally), but he did know that Neville lived with his grandmother and that she wasn’t the warmest person in the world.

 

They opened the myriad gifts owled to them, including a pair of socks each from Dumbledore, and ate more sweets than they perhaps should have considering Madame Pomfrey wasn’t handing out Stomach Soothing potions today.

 

The letters they received, Harry sadly more than Neville, were nice but Harry was ready to write the day off as a failed Christmas and set his sights and hopes on next year when he might really be able to feel the Christmas spirit.

 

And then he received a late present from an unknown sender, and he’d know the shape anywhere. He tore the wrapping from his broom at the lunch table, ignoring the startled looks of those around him, which peaked when they saw exactly what type of broom he had been gifted. A Firebolt, not even out on the market.

 

Oliver Wood had been quietly chatting with his friend when he had seen Harry receive a broom. It was a perfect result because otherwise he would have had to use a school broom, infamous for their slow manoeuvres and poor speed. And then he saw the Firebolt and he jumped clear out of his seat. Finally, he would have the magical advantage over Slytherin again, like they had had in Harry’s first year when he had the Nimbus 2000 but before that slime Malfoy bribed the Slytherin team with 2001’s.

 

Perhaps not the typical Christmas tidings, but McGonagall was certainly glad to see some cheer in her House (because she was in no way showing any sort of preference for her House’s Quidditch team.)

 

Albus was, as he usually was on this most holy of days, secluded in his office away from the students and staff at his wonderful school. The joy and good tidings of Christmas were for the young who had not seen everyone they loved pass on into the next great adventure. He had no family left to speak of (since Aberforth was not someone he liked to speak of or to) so every year at this time he hid away from those who respected or admired him, and considered those whom he had lost.

 

He took a break from the letter on his desk and peered out of his window at the snowy grounds below. He could just make out Remus wandering aimlessly through the fields towards the Forbidden Forest. It wasn’t right that he had lost almost as much as an old man like him. At least Albus had the reassurance that his own friend turned enemy, Gellert, was still safely locked up in Nurmengard.

 

Then again, for people like Remus and him, those were simply the hardest losses to bear: those who were no longer friends.

 

He knew Remus found a great solace in the woods surrounding the school. Whether that was due to his wolfish leanings, or because of the memories he held of his friends and him in the forest when they were students, Albus didn’t know. But for people like them, Christmas was a time to remember those they would rather have spent the day with.

 

He sat back down with a groan and finished his letter, already over five pages long and detailing all that had happened in the past year since his last letter and his kindest wishes to the recipient. He signed it off: ‘ With all of the love and care in the world, your enduring friend, Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, etc.’

 

After he had finished with a flourish, he sealed the envelope with his personal insignia and wrote on the front: ‘To Gellert’.

 

With that done, Albus opened his lowest desk drawer and swept the thick letter into it, watching it fall atop the large pile of identical letters already gathering dust in the expansive drawer. Nurmengard didn’t allow communication with their prisoner, under any circumstances or from anybody.

 

He missed his friend.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

“You scoundrel!” Sirius bellowed as he swung his fist into the side of Remus’ face.

 

“You idiot, I told you already,” Remus barked back, wiping blood from his chin and managing a rather satisfying elbow to the side of Sirius’s head. “Boxing day isn’t until tomorrow.”

 

“Who can wait until then?!” Sirius kneed Remus in the stomach and tried to punch him in the back of the head but Remus grabbed his leg and unbalanced him, putting them both on the floor.

 

They grappled for a while longer in the woods, their fight also keeping the frigid cold away for the moment, until finally they collapsed exhausted.

 

“That’s how you know I’ve been affected by Azkaban, once upon a time even the rat could have taken you this close to a full moon without breaking a sweat.” Sirius panted, debating with himself whether he should transform before the cold hit him.

 

“Like it or not, Sirius, we’re both old men now. We can’t be rushing around like we used to.”

 

“Speak for yourself. ‘ _Old man_ ’, indeed. I’m only thirty-one.”

 

“You’re thirty-four, Sirius.”

 

“You can’t be serious.”

 

“I’m not falling for that one. Now come on, it’s only going to get colder and us old men need shelter.”

 

“I’m not old!” Sirius chased after his friend, determined that tomorrow’s (surprise) rematch was going to put Moony back in his place.

 

He wished he could have been there to see Harry’s and Lily’s faces when they received their brooms. No matter what Lupin said about Lily hating brooms and magical transport, Sirius knew that as soon as he saw he had a Firebolt he would fall in love with it. After all, even a some simpleton who didn’t like Quiddictch couldn’t help but enjoy flying when they had such a piece of artwork with which to do it.

 

Moony had just laughed.

 

At least he knew that despite Gaara being in Slytherin, a lamentable twist of fate, only Gryffindor would get the boost for their Quidditch team. Even after Gaara started to enjoy flying, it would take him a while to get scouted for the team, so Gryffindor would undoubtedly have the edge for the rest of the year.

 

They both returned to the Shrieking Shack and ate heartily and spoke of happier times in the past. It was the best Christmas either had experienced in the last twelve years.

 

And later Remus would return to the castle and talk to Harry about his parents some more.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Gaara had lied about Dumbledore calling him back, but all the same he had needed to travel back to Hogwarts before the holidays were up, and springing it on Draco was the best way to stop his friend from insisting on coming too.

 

The full moon was on the twenty-ninth of December, only three days after Christmas, and Gaara was acutely aware of his vulnerability around that time. Since there was no way in whatever hell he still believed in that he would let Draco know about his problem, he had to leave the manor early. And since he was still largely ignorant about this England and its bordering countries, Gaara didn’t feel confident about being powerless and looking like something of a fluffy morsel in a strange place. So he had decided to return to the grounds of Hogwarts for his inevitable and detestable change.

 

The journey felt like twice the distance the maps indicated, perhaps because of the cold, or perhaps because every dozen miles he had to skirt around a city or a town or a busy road. He never would have made it in time if he had insisted on sleeping like his selfish body tried to insist upon.

 

By the time he saw the peaks of the Scottish highlands, he felt more tired than he could remember being in months. It didn’t help that the nice packed lunch Mrs Malfoy had given him had fallen off of his sand platform somewhere over the river Avon, and so he hadn’t eaten in the past two days. A normal human probably would have collapsed a hundred miles ago, under the combined strain of travelling so far and from hunger, but Gaara was by very few definitions a (normal) human.

 

It was midday of the twenty-eighth and Gaara decided he would ‘arrive’ tomorrow morning, once he had collected his clothes and sand from whichever tree he picked. Sneaking back into the castle or arriving now would only draw suspicion, and the last thing he needed was people focussing on him tonight.

 

Fortunately, he had the foresight to bring a book and to leave the rest of his possessions with Draco. There was no need for his travels to be weighed down when he could have Draco bring everything to him.

 

He could have spent the day with Sirius, but again he hit the problem of having to disappear again in the evening. He would see Sirius and Remus tomorrow, after he had check in at the school.

 

When the evening came, far too early in the day for Gaara’s taste, he stopped off in the deepest parts of the woods and set down his gourd and most of what he had on him, just leaving his clothes on for the moment. It would be easier to take them off too and fold them ready for the morning, rather than transforming in them and then having to awkwardly crawl out of them and dump them somewhere. But it was literally freezing cold and he could deal with wrinkled clothes in the morning. Better that than having to stand naked in the woods while fighting off the frostbite and indignity with his bare hands.

 

And then he felt it, the change that had pained him so much on the first night and now was more of a looming inconvenience. In minutes he had turned into his little-tanuki form and was running about the woods, trying to expend some of the limitless energy this body maintained.

 

All things concerned, Gaara believed it was the least eventful night he had forcibly been transformed into a four-legged mini demon tanuki that he could remember. His life was not placed in mortal danger, in fact he hardly encounter any creatures at all that night, except one slow moving Acromantula, which had sadly met its end by being squashed by a super plush but surprisingly weighty tail.

 

When the morning came and Gaara had found his clothes without any undue stress or drama, he almost pinched himself.

 

He dressed himself and set off, trying to work some heat into his freezing body, his clothes having collected a layer of frost in the night and his warming cloak not defrosting the small desert dweller quickly enough. He would go and see Sirius, but not before a hot bath and maybe a good meal.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

January second came to Hogwarts along with the Hogwarts Express, and as they did every time the train pulled into the station, Minerva and Albus watched from atop the Astronomy Tower as the students swarmed back onto the station platform. He had always enjoyed watching both the start of the year arrivals, with the skittish First Years and the exuberant returning upper years, and the post-Christmas students coming back to the castle with all of their holiday cheer and familial sentiment refilled.

 

Minerva observed that for the first time in the twenty years since she had first been invited to join in his little ritual, Albus Dumbledore was not smiling as he watched his beloved children coming home, and she knew precisely why. In fact, she was in mood to smile herself with the grim spectacle taking place in the opposite direction to the station.

 

Out, above the Forbidden Forrest and the lake, flew a swarm of an entirely antithetical nature to the other. Bound within a bubble of Patroni maintained by a dozen Azkaban agents, were more Dementors than the aged professors could count and certainly more than either had ever seen in one place.

 

“It’s now Minerva,” Albus said solemnly, not taking his eyes off of the dark flock being corralled until the students were safely inside the wards. “Today is the day the world changes again.”

 

“Albus?”

 

“Everything is changing again, Minerva, just like it did on that night. October thirty-first, nineteen-eighty-one. But this time, no one but us will mark this date on the calendar as anything but the day that the children returned to Hogwarts, as they did every year.”

 

Albus turned to her, and the twinkle was long gone from his eye. In those blue depths, she didn’t see the familiar grandfather figure who had devoted the better part of his life to teaching children, instead she saw the battle-hardened eyes of a warrior wizard who had fought in both of the Great Wars and countless wizarding ones in between.

 

“The Ministry of Magic, our Ministry, is declaring war on us. I never thought I would live to see it happen.” Albus murmured. ‘But they’re not really. They are declaring war on fear and the dark under their beds. They are declaring their war on Gaara and the change he might bring about.’

 

The Dementors were beginning to buzz and fly about agitated within their confines, and it soon became clear why: the ball of light burst and they exploded out like a blanket of smoke.

 

“I always used to like the view from up here.” Albus commented as he turned back to the stairs. “It’s a shame.”

 


	9. A New Humiliation

“Welcome back to our illustrious Hogwarts, all of our returning students and teachers. I hope your break was used wisely and was not frittered away on celebration and merriment.” Dumbledore announced to the full hall, enjoying the knowing looks that flew his way from even the youngest of students. He knew he was doing his job properly when even children knew what he stood for.

 

He took stock of all of the smiling faces around him, and knew he was definitely doing the right thing in not telling the children about some of the startling new developments around them. Perhaps it was wrong of him, a celebrated educator who was supposed to cherish and impart knowledge above all else, to hide a scary truth in favour of blissful ignorance.

 

One of the countless signs of his advancing age: his growing sentimentality.

 

Or maybe he was learning from his past mistakes. There were so many to choose from, it was inevitable that he learn a few hard lessons along the way.

 

And one such lesson was sat apart from his Slytherin compatriots, gingerly eating one dish or another. He had had to confront the visage of Tom when Harry appeared three years before, and he had taken a different route with the boy from Tom. But Gaara was more difficult.

 

Harry might have been Tom reborn, were it not for a few biographical factors and a few decisions on Albus’ part, but Gaara was, and remained to this day, something of a mystery. But he knew from previous mistakes what not to do, and alienating such entities had never yielded anything but enemies. He did not know precisely where he was to guide the less-than-impressionable boy; but, if nothing else, he was having a magnificent effect on Lucius’ son, who had been so indoctrinated by the time he arrived Albus had feared he was lost to the darkness.

 

Miracles from strange places, indeed.

 

Now, if only he could help Severus…

 

Draco hadn’t appreciated the fact that Gaara had (most likely with malice of forethought) left all of his school supplies behind for Draco to haul back to school. Despite all the retributions and castigations he’d promised himself he would heap upon his roommate, the moment he saw Gaara sat in the Great Hall, munching on something or other, he just felt glad to see him. Yet another one of those instances where his upbringing and his friend’s quite literal personal boundaries were the only things between Gaara and a hug.

 

“I’m glad to see you made it back here okay.” Draco settled for passive aggression, still peeved about both his being ditched with the bags and because he had (admittedly naively) expected Gaara to send an owl confirming he had arrived safely.

 

One would have expected a boy who couldn’t speak would send more missives, but it seemed to Draco not for the first time that Gaara was uniquely suited to mutism. He imagined that Gaara hadn’t spoken much more even when he was able.

 

‘Welcome back.’ Gaara sand had drifted up from his new expanded bag, presumably being used simply to store only his sand.

 

After a short blank stare as Gaara waited for the next part of the conversation, he gave up and went back to his dinner.

 

“Well, how did it go with Dumbledore?”

 

‘Dumbledore?’ Gaara kept his sand low to keep it out of the namesake’s sight.

 

“You came back for the test, right?” Draco was now sceptical of his friend’s early return. Though he had been curious to start with when Gaara had first mentioned going back since, Draco had wracked his memory, he had never known Gaara to follow anybody’s orders when he didn’t want to.

 

He knew better than to air his doubts since he would never pull an answer out of Gaara. The boy was uncommunicative, both literally and with his churlish personality, but he picked the most frustrating times to play up his mutism.

 

Meanwhile, Gaara was unintentionally ignoring Draco’s conversation in favour of planning his next dementor hunt. He might not kill people here, the opportunities for a good (and morally justifiable) fight were few and far in between, but from what he had seen since he had arrived back in the Scottish highlands, there were plenty dementors around for him to slaughter.

 

Whoever was in charge of them had obviously decided that the previous (diminishing) number had been insufficient and had elected to multiply them tenfold. Highly irresponsible, reckless, excessive, dangerous… but Gaara found himself ultimately praising the move. It was the best form of entertainment he had in this world, and so far the prison guard creatures had seemed woefully inept at tracking down Sirius. The only other concern would be that they attacked the students again, which might include the two students he actually cared a mite for.

 

That being said, the administration at the school appeared to have strengthened their resolve and their remit to protect their students. He hadn’t encountered one of the wraith-like creatures within five hundred metres of the school boundaries since that Quidditch match. Made him trek a little further to go hunting, but even he couldn’t really faulty the move.

 

Of course, his freedom at the end of the Christmas break hadn’t been all dementor-slaughter all the time. Though he had considered it…

 

He had played with Fluffy a fair amount, but only because he was passing through the woods to see Sirius and it was only a little bit out of his way to see the mutt. And since he had been there, he also continued his struggling attempts at teaching the dumb animal some much needed obedience.

 

Sirius himself had been very glad to see him, calling him Lily and refusing to say his real name even under threat of death.

 

He had been all smiles and attempted hugs right up until Gaara mentioned that he had passed the fancy broom onto Draco since the boy had needed it much more than Gaara. Then Sirius had gone from happy to sulky, and then downright distraught when he had been unhelpfully reminded by Lupin that Draco was on the Slytherin house team.

 

Lupin made his mischief much more subtly than the other Marauders, it was true.

 

It had taken all of half an hour before he was willing to look in Gaara’s general direction, and even then he refused to stop sulking loudly.

 

Of course, an amused Remus told Sirius off for his behaviour since he had been warned that Gaara didn’t like brooms and he was supposed to be the adult. Sirius had responded by blowing raspberries at the pair of them and turning into a dog.

 

As Sirius woofed scornfully in the corner, Remus discussed his plans for the upcoming shared tutoring session for Gaara and Harry. The adult knew that both boys greatly resented the other’s presence intensely, and while he knew it would make his job that much harder, a little hubristic sliver made Lupin’s ego bloat with the thought that the two students were fighting over him and his time.

 

He had always wanted to be a professor, since he was a teenager. It was gratifying for him to know at least a few of his students valued his teaching.

 

Draco continued to ponder why Gaara had ditched him over the break, ignoring the niggling doubt in the back of his mind that suggest that Gaara might have just left because he hadn’t like it at Draco’s home. That his manor was too small and poorly decorated, or that the food had been sloppy, that his bed linens hadn’t had a high enough thread count. Admittedly, these were more Draco’s kinds of issues, but there had to be a reason Gaara left early.

 

He knew for certain that he would be puzzling this mystery out for a while as well. He would have to add it to the list. In the meantime, at least the other Slytherins weren’t going to such exaggerated lengths to sit away from Gaara anymore. It would seem that the Malfoy Christmas shindig had done something to repair a little of the damage Gaara had inflicted upon his own reputation in the previous term.

 

The feast was as lively as ever, but underneath it all ran the ever-present fear that had pervaded Hogwarts since Sirius Black and those assigned to capture him had targeted this school. Dumbledore had neglected to mention the newly increased presence of dementors, but not one student had failed to take notice of the swarms that were circling the grounds from afar. They didn’t know specifics but they knew things had gotten worse.

 

Suddenly, a psychotic, teacher-fighting, insomniac, mute, mysterious sand-using, transfer student was no longer a real cause for fear. He was the least of anybody’s concerns.

 

Well, except for Snape. That man really hated Gaara.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Harry was ecstatic to see Ron and Hermione again, though he tried to not to show his excitement too openly. He was still a self conscious teenager after all.

 

They were glad to see him too, telling him each that they hadn’t wanted to go home for Christmas but their parents had forced them. It was awkward, but Harry swiftly moved on to talking happily about what they had all been getting up to whilst separated.

 

It was towards the end of Harry’s anecdote about how Dean had managed to set Seamus’ bed curtains alight by touching one of the Irish boy’s self-brewed sleeping draughts that he fell into more serious topics.

 

There hadn’t been any movement from Black over Christmas as they had all feared, which they attributed to the fact that not one of the teachers had left the school over the break as half usually did. In fact, they had most often been found ‘wandering’ the hallways during various stages of the days and nights. Harry had frequently watched Professor Lupin patrolling the Forbidden Forrest, strolling out of the map’s range and appearing hours later.

 

McGonagall had even gone so far as to camp out in the Gryffindor common room most days, sitting in front of the fire with one heavy tome or another.

 

It was both touching and wondrous to see his stern Head of House relaxing so openly in front of her lions. When one of the older students had asked, unable to hold back his curiosity, Minerva had simply said that it was her holiday too and it was warmer in her old House than her quarters.

 

Ron and Hermione hadn’t believed it, and Fred and George, who had joined them in the middle of the story, had bemoaned their absence during their beloved professor’s time of vulnerability.

 

“McGonagall probably wouldn’t have risked sitting in the common room if the two of you had been here.” And it was this awareness of the twin’s mischief that kept Harry from mentioning the multiple times their Transfiguration professor had disappeared only to be replaced by a cat.

 

“I see Malfoy and his new henchman came back after all. I guess you can’t curse someone long distance after all.”

 

“Ron! I know that Malfoy is a monstrous little…” Hermione seemed to struggle to find the right word without appearing unladylike, “so-and-so, but you shouldn’t go around starting fights. And I will assume you were just joking about the ‘long distance curse’ thing.”

 

“Yes ma’am.” Ron mumbled, continuing to glare in the Slytherin table’s direction.

 

“And we should try to get along with Gaara more this year. I can’t speak for his being in Slytherin, but as far as I know he isn’t a blood purist at least. Apparently he’s even friends with Luna Lovegood.”

 

“Loony Lovegood? She’s Ginny’s mate. I remember they were talking on Halloween but I don’t think they’re really friends, Hermione.” Ron scoffed.

 

“I heard on the train that he invited her to the big Malfoy Christmas party.”

 

“My dad says that’s just an annual Death Eater reunion.”

 

“Honestly Ron, the Minister of Magic and dozens of other people go. They can’t all be followers of You-Know-Who.”

 

“Wouldn’t bet on it.” Harry grumbled, his animosity towards the pair of his Slytherin peers already well-set in place.

 

Hermione huffed, but even she couldn’t deny she had reservations about anybody who would be willing to go to a gathering at Malfoy manor.

 

“Oh, I can’t believe I forgot,” Harry said, “take a guess at who arrived back early.”

 

Ron had no clue, “Who?”

 

“The psychopath, Gaara. I saw him on the map a few days ago. He never came to the Hall until now, though.”

 

“Do you think the map might be wrong, then?” Hermione asked, wishing again that Harry had let her properly examine it before he handed it over to the proper authorities.

 

“Maybe, but I don’t think so. It’s not been wrong yet for anybody else.”

 

“How do you think he got back? The Express only makes the trip when everyone’s going back and forth.” Ron asked.

 

“Yes, but just the express train. There are trains going from London to Scotland all the time, and even a few magical ones that make the trip to Hogsmeade, though that’s mostly for sightseeing.”

 

“You think Gaara was sightseeing?” Harry was incredulous.

 

“No, I didn’t say that. Maybe he took the Floo, or someone _drove_ him here,” She looked pointedly at Ron, “Maybe he took a broom. As long as he rested along the way, I don’t see why he couldn’t make it in a day or two from south England.”

 

“Except that Gaara hates flying, I heard.” Ron said. Seamus heard it from a fourth year Ravenclaw, who heard it from a ‘Puff, who heard it from someone else, who heard it from one of Malfoy’s lackeys.” Ron said, more focussed on trying to remember the forgotten link.

 

“Why do you think he dislikes flying? He’s certainly not afraid of heights.” Hermione posed.

 

“I’ve seen him standing around in the high towers loads of times.” Harry said, referring to his map.

 

“Might be something to do with that Hippogriff that dropped him a while back.” Ron said, in between bites of roast pork.

 

Harry didn’t answer, instead he looked over again to where he had last seen Malfoy sitting with Gaara. He flinched when he saw that Gaara’s bug-eyes were pointing in his direction already and they made no haste to turn away.

 

Meanwhile, Gaara wondered if Sirius and Remus’ best friend had been as annoying as his son. Surely not.

 

But then, Sirius’ propensity to annoy didn’t speak volumes to the respectability of James Potter. Nonetheless, as he stared over at Potter junior, he wondered whether he should try not to antagonise him since he was Sirius’s godson and would likely be a factor in Gaara’s life as long as he remained in this world.

 

Though, Gaara had always found, since he started to pay attention to people’s feelings, that he had a way of inadvertently upsetting and unsettling those around him without any intention behind it at all. Kankuro would be a prime example to this, time and time again.

 

Temari said it was that he intimidated people, but surely he had done that much more when he was a murderer, and people looked a lot more annoyed now than they ever did then. Less angry now, mind you, but infinitely more annoyed.

 

Draco was thinking much the same thing, along the lines of: ‘how come mother and father didn’t try to curse Gaara?’

 

Narcissa had even talked about how nice Gaara had seemed, and something about him being a ‘good investment.’ His father had said, all along but doubly so after Gaara left, that the red-head could be useful but not to be overly dependent (read: trusting) of his new friend.

 

He had talked, briefly, to his mother about Gaara’s boggart. He knew both of his parents knew about his own boggart, mostly from the slap he got from his father for suggesting some sort of family conflict to his schoolmates. His mother had looked on but said nothing, only rubbed his cheek and went back to writing thank you notes.

 

It was two days later that Narcissa had been saying how nice Gaara seemed, and had covertly asked what he was like in classes. And then she asked how he had reacted to his boggart, and absently asked what it was. Draco didn’t see a point in futilely trying to hide it from her, so he told her about the woman, probably Gaara’s mother, who had whispered in his ear and how Gaara had killed the thing.

 

Narcissa had been appropriately shocked, having long wondered like everybody else how much of a weapon Gaara’s sand could be made into. She had also asked more about Gaara’s family, if Draco knew anything, but he didn’t really. Gaara’s was as much a mystery to him as anybody, except that he knew Gaara as a kind and good person.

 

All the stranger, that he had been placed in Slytherin, really. He wasn’t the most crafty strategist. He was more the blunt-force-diplomacy sort of tactician. Draco supposed there might be a hidden ambition that Gaara had never shared, or perhaps the secrets that Gaara kept hidden were done so purposefully and not just because he was absent-minded or uninterested in talking about himself.

 

Maybe there was the same darkness stitched into Gaara’s heart that existed in all of the snakes. Gaara was a warrior in his homeland, but something told Draco that fighting hadn’t been all that Gaara did to earn his traumatised disposition.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

The next morning, after a long night of trying to sleep with someone else in the same room again, Gaara entered the Great Hall to yet another day of drama. He swung by the gathering crowd stood by the middle of the Gryffindor. Draco followed presumably.

 

When there, he heard the nosy Granger girl yelling, “You have to, Harry! You don’t know who sent it to you and Sirius Black might have put a curse on it.”

 

“Aw, leave off ‘Mione. If it was cursed, Harry would have already been struck by it. He’d been holding it since he got it, I bet.” Ron defended his friend(‘s broom.)

 

Harry blushed at the revelation that he had fallen in love with his state-of-the-art broom. “Not all the time- Look, I’m not just gonna assume it’s cursed because you say it is. It could be from anybody, Hermione. I don’t want the Ministry or the professors breaking it while searching for non-existent curses.” Harry was clearly losing his temper, judging by the tone of his voice and the size of Draco’s smile. Gaara figured it might be worth butting in before Draco did.

 

“Well, then I might have to do what’s best for all of us. I’m not going to let you risk your life over a silly broom.”

 

While Ron saw red at that last comment, Gaara pushed his way through the crowd to the front.

 

‘I received a Firebolt for Christmas too.’ His sand quickly drew eyes and then open mouths, widest of all from Draco.

 

“Is that where my Christmas present came from?!” Draco was ignored by everyone but the Gryffindor team members present, who quickly uniformly swore under their breaths at the revelation that their Seeker’s new advantage had been nullified.

 

“Well, if the prince of darkness over there got one, they’re obviously not cursed,” said Ron.

 

Hermione thought for a second, “They might just have cursed one and sent the other as a distraction.” No one thought for a second that she meant anybody but the Malfoys sent the broom.

 

‘Then swap them. They are identical, yes?’ Gaara said. He wouldn’t have been so blasé about Draco’s life (especially when those devilish brooms were involved) but since he knew exactly who had sent them, he felt relatively safe in their swapping the brooms.

 

“You would do that?” Hermione asked, her question as sceptical as Harry’s face.

 

“No, of course-” Draco was interrupted when the sand unnecessarily loudly shifted into an agreement. With this in mind, Harry and Ron were started to look as suspicious as Hermione’s own wariness lifted.

 

“Does this mean you know who the brooms were from?” Hermione had put the pieces together so Gaara figured he might as well own up.

 

‘Yes, I do. They are safe.’

 

“Who are they from?” Harry said, addressing Gaara finally.

 

Gaara stared at them but his sand failed to shift into words and eventually funnelled back into the bag on his belt. He turned around and left without a glance back, prompting sighs, face-palms and the Golden Trio trying to get him to answer the question or suggesting possible suspects.

 

“You know, playing up the whole ‘mute’ thing is really annoying sometimes.” Draco said, catching up after Potter had decided he didn’t want to switch brooms with Malfoy after all.

 

Gaara glanced back at him as they made their way over to their table. “Don’t get me wrong, it’s never a bad thing when it’s directed at Potter and his meddlesome friends. But between us, who did send the brooms? I should probably thank them.” Draco was trying valiantly not to show how peeved he was with Gaara’s deception and receiving a re-gifted broom. If it had been anything but a Firebolt, he would thrust it back in Gaara’s face and wait for his father to send him another Nimbus 2001.

 

Gaara stopped and looked blankly at his questioning friend, then continued to their seats at the table, smirking to himself when heard Draco’s indignation from seven feet away.

 

Later on in the day, at lunch, McGonagall approached Harry and asked if there was anything suspicious about the broom other than the unknown sender, to which he had vehemently denied even that, and said that Gaara knew who had sent them. McGonagall had wanted to confiscate them, as had Snape, but Dumbledore said that they would trust Gaara for the moment, and have the boys take the brooms out for a short test run under safe conditions.

 

If nothing went wrong, they would be cleared for the time being. Harry was ecstatic, Hermione was unsure, and Ron was upset that his precious pet rat had gone missing since the night before.

 

Scabbers had obviously escaped the boy’s dormitory, and no amount of pleading had convinced McGonagall to let him search the girl’s dormitory.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Lessons the first day back seemed to go about as well for Gaara as they had of his first ever day at the Wizarding school. His spells, even the more benign ones, had turned into deadly blasts that his seasoned teachers knew to expect and deflect. Though, that said, his academics had improved further yet, especially in the fields that were related to his private research goals. In those areas, he was easily leagues above even Hermione’s or the Ravenclaws’ abilities. In other areas, he trailed behind and peaked out in front of the highest students.

 

If his spell casting weren’t so atrocious, he would have been a model student. Other than the personality issues…

 

Most of the teachers knew how to deal with him by now, leaving him to his own devices except when they needed to verify how he was coping with the material. He didn’t bring many surprises anymore, except to the Divinations teacher who seemed perpetually surprised by the ‘future’ she saw for him and the rest of the class.

 

Gaara did manage to surprise Trelawney and his classmates when, upon being asked if he knew of any methods of divination not mentioned in their (oddly comprehensive) text books. He had smiled a little and had rummaged through his bags as his sand explained that he had wanted to ask about this device that he had been told was a very powerful artefact for prophesying the future.

 

Draco and a number of other students had spit up their tea when they saw Gaara pull out a Magic 8-Ball. The Muggle toy was known even to purebloods and caused a fair amount of laughter as well as a dumbfounded look on Trelawney’s face. She had had a muggleborn present her with one some years ago as a joke, but on Gaara’s porcelain face she saw nothing but confusion at the ruckus.

 

Draco pulled him aside and hastily explained that somebody had obviously been playing a prank on Gaara. Presumably someone he had met on his way from Somerset to Scotland.

 

Gaara had blushed (blushed! Of all things) and threw the plastic toy out of the window, vowing revenge on Sirius for presenting him with the ‘ancient and powerful Black artefact.’

 

He had to endure smirks through the entire day, making him realise he missed the fear.

 

He disappeared during lunch, his hunger fading at the thought of hearing people laugh at his gullibility. This left Draco free to approach his Head of House without instigating a war of some sorts.

 

As far as he could see, there was no reason for Snape to hate Gaara as entirely as he did. Severus hadn’t even hated Harry as much as he hated Gaara, which meant either the man had (fairly enough) lost his mind, or there was a reason no one else was aware of.

 

As dicey a subject as it was, Draco decided he had to broach it with his trusted Head of House nonetheless. The question had been bothering him all day and he couldn’t think of anybody he trusted enough to ask of than Snape.

 

“Sir?” Draco asked just before the bat-type man could enter the Hall.

 

“Yes, what is it Draco?” Severus usually hated eating in the Great Hall, with all of the clamour and chatter, but today he was famished, so Draco’s interrupting him was less than welcome. 

 

“Sir, did the headmaster tell you anything about testing Gaara over the holiday?” If Gaara had taken this test during the break, he knew he would never hear how it went from the examinee. Killing two birds with one stone.

 

“What test? I would be well aware if that aberration had returned to the school early, both as Head of Slytherin and because he is a menace.”

 

The innate survival instincts still alive in Draco warned him off of asking about Snape’s obvious and seemingly pointless hatred of Gaara, and instead he said, “Oh, my mistake. I must have misunderstood what he was saying. Nevermind. Enjoy your lunch, sir.” He then tried to speed walk away casually.

 

Either Dumbldedore hadn’t seen fit to include Gaara’s Head of House in his plans to assess Gaara’s progress or Snape wasn’t allowed to talk about it, or else there had been no such test in the first place. The final option brought back the question of why Gaara had lied to him.

 

Another thing, but much less important, since his scars had begun to fade, presumably with Madame Pomfrey’s ongoing help, Gaara had stopped wearing his metal plate around his neck. He always carried it on him, but he seldom covered the decreasingly prominent scar on his neck anymore.

 

Then again, Gaara did a whole host of unusual things; it wouldn’t do to get bogged down in the little details.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Typical Scottish weather for the time of year (that span between September and August) treated the students to the odd view of torrential rain falling harmlessly against the roof of the Great Hall yet again as they enjoyed their dinner. Draco was eating his regular meagre meal (as a nobleman, it wouldn’t do to get fat, and it was uncommon for one such as him to exercise, so diet it was) and enjoying the lively conversation he was open to when Gaara decided not to join him.

 

His red-haired roommate was at another of his evening tutorials but unlike Potter, he hadn’t taken a break to come to dinner. It made Draco pity Lupin just a little, since the man likely wasn’t as happy to miss meals as his psychotic friend. Knowing Professor Lupin, he was far too polite to tell Gaara otherwise.

 

Being around his old peers, it reminded Draco of one of the last things his parents had discussed with him prior to his return to school, namely Gaara’s place in their world.

 

Draco had never had faced an issue with any of his old friends, not because they were _normal_ Slytherins, but because they were Purebloods from wealthy backgrounds. Gaara was an abnormal Slytherin Pureblood but with no family of money to speak of. In other words, he was a nobody.

 

Malfoys did not associate with nobodies, his parents had both insisted, so they needed a nominal way to explain Gaara’s place near them, or else risk losing some of their own stature. Sadly, the only politically acceptable positions available for a boy like Gaara were serving ones. His father had candidly suggested an official ‘cup bearer’ as it would only require Gaara to serve a function at formal events and would be seen as the formality that it was.

 

Unfortunately, Draco had a vivid imagining of his own death at Gaara’s deceptively petite hands if he suggested such a demeaning title to Gaara.

 

Draco would have suggested Gaara be his bodyguard but while that was the perfect job for him, it couldn’t be said (aloud) that Malfoys needed bodyguards. Especially ones like Gaara. It would make him, and by extension the family, look weak and helpless.

 

For all of their many faults, Crabbe and Goyle had been convenient. They were intimidating enough to _act_ as bodyguards but were from prominent enough families that there had been no issues with their placements at his side. They were school friends and would have grown to be colleagues (of vastly different levels.) Gaara could never hope to achieve the same sort of future as Draco (or even his old goons), and Draco couldn’t stoop to some plebeian’s level out of some misbegotten sense of sentimental loyalty.

 

His mother’s suggestion had been much more palatable, if still a little demeaning. Then again, he supposed there wasn’t likely going to be a dignified position for Gaara. Still, asking Gaara to pose as his ‘valet’ until he could hire him as a bodyguard when they finished school would likely result in a concussion. 

 

His parents would only bite their tongues for so long before they either forced Draco to hire or drop his friend, or else they would approach Gaara directly. In Draco’s mind, the less contact they had directly with Gaara the better, for everyone involved.

 

As Draco mulled over his aristocratic problems, Gaara had his own issues to be contending with, though he would argue that it was Harry that had the problem.

 

Lupin had started this first shared tutorial by trying to reach a common area of ability in both students from which to work from, and that had not gone well. For one, Gaara was hopelessly outmatched in terms of magical skill and ability if not power, and Harry was completely outshone in academic knowledge. So, not only did they intensely dislike each other (which they went about behaving remarkably like children), but they were also totally incompatible to learn with one another.

 

There was no chance he could teach Gaara the Patronus since it would take no small miracle for Harry to learn it. Little did he know, Gaara would have refused the futile offer had it been extended since he had no need to drive off dementors when he had such fun in killing them.

 

That had led to Lupin to doing twice the work to provide both boys with separate lessons to help bring them to a higher level. Though, for Gaara, it was more like bringing his spellcasting up to average.

 

And yet more work was thrust upon him when Harry went off to have dinner and Gaara blithely continued to practice, occasionally calling on Lupin to correct his posture or wand motion. The man was really hungry and could do with getting some dinner in him, but every time he tried to tell Gaara this, he would make some terrible blunder and Lupin wouldn’t feel safe leaving him.

 

He would then spend the next week working up the nerve and the right words to kick Gaara out of their next tutoring session so that he might eat. He would inevitably fail in this endeavour, and his conviction that his hair was prematurely turning fully grey would harden.

 

It didn’t help that Sirius had taken to calling him ‘old man.’

 

The tutoring session ended shortly before curfew was set to begin, long after any chance of Lupin catching a late dinner, though the teacher assumed the timing was a coincidence since Gaara’s disregard of the school curfew was already legend.

 

As it turned out, Gaara’s timing was coincidental as he had no plans to return to his room that night. At least, not until he had completed the ritual he had swiped from one of the Malfoys’ many dark books.

 

He had been disappointed by the distinct lack of useful material in the Malfoy library, but he didn’t blame them. If he had been planning to assassinate a dozen wizards without using sand, he would have been spoilt for materials. There had been at least seven books dedicated to the subject of disembowelling, Gaara had counted.

 

Still, he had come to count his successes over his failures, and finding a ritual that showed one the way home from wherever they were, was definitely one of his better successes. He had had to wait until now because he had needed a few potion ingredients that were harder to snatch when the onerous potions keeper didn’t have classes to prepare for. Snape had been annoyingly vigilant over the break, and hadn’t given Gaara a chance to raid his cupboard.

 

As soon as Snape had Slytherins to wrangle and lessons to prepare, his larder was left unguarded and Gaara had wasted no time before swooping in and taking what he needed, and a little of what he wanted as well. There was every chance he wouldn’t be able to get back in for a while after this theft was noticed so he figured he might as well pilfer a few other things he couldn’t get elsewhere.

 

The potion was easy enough to make, luckily for him, but it did require a few drops of his blood as well as dirt from his homeland (of which he still had some in his gourd) and a couple of other ‘dark’ ingredients. To be safe, he had taken twice the required ingredients from Snape’s stores, safe in the knowledge that Snape was an ass and had it coming.

 

When his potion turned the correct colour, as described in the surprisingly detailed instructions, he knew he was on the right track. The last step was the one that necessitated blood and he did not hesitate in shedding the few meagre drops into the ominously bubbling cauldron.

 

The potion turned the desired shade of indigo and he bottled a small amount up and walked away. He had again used one of the many abandoned classrooms from times when young witches and wizards had been more plentiful, so he didn’t worry about leaving evidence behind for teachers to see. He could come back and clean it up in a day or two.

 

In the meantime, he needed to get to the Astronomy tower. Another requisite for the potion to work was that it needed to be used under starlight, which was easier said than done during a Scottish winter. On the bright side, it was the starry night he needed and it was quite beautiful, on the other side, it was even colder without the cloud blanket and warm-spelled cloaks only did so much.

 

At this rate, he thought, he would be lucky if the potion didn’t freeze.

 

He took out a sheet of fresh parchment and poured seven thick drops of the viscous potion onto it. The potion should then have drawn a compass on the sheet that would point towards his home. Instead, to Gaara’s growing rage, the potion spelled out the words ‘Elsewhere’ in a mockery of his own written communications.

 

When no more information was forthcoming, Gaara silently screamed, hurting his redundant voice box further, and throwing the remainder of the potion against the floor. He looked around the open air tower for something to hit or smash, but there was nothing up there so he took a running leap off of the tallest tower, calling his sand out as he fell.

 

The sand platform carried him into the forest with all due haste, the sand apparently sensing how urgently Gaara needed to get away from the castle and towards the killable things.

 

Gaara encountered the first dementor above the tree line, its robes dusting the tops of the trees as it glided along, looking for Sirius or possibly an innocent and vulnerable child to consume. He wanted to scream at it as he sent his sand to grab hold of it, but he settled for the satisfying rattling breaths that escaped the monster he was crushing to dust.

 

The wheezing dying sounds of the dementor acted as a beacon to the others in the area. Gaara watched as dozens of the creatures wandered up from the barren braches and through the mist towards where he was standing on his sand platform. ScSThe quickly gathering swarm were all around him, so Gaara descended to the forest floor and prepared himself for battle.

 

The dementors moved far too slowly for him, the anticipation building while they lazily approached the bright soul that had killed one of their kind. It was silent on the forest floor, presumably all of the wildlife having been scared off by the pressure of the oncoming storm.

 

And then the flock of dementors swept down from the canopy and commenced their attacks, trying to suck out his chakra or his soul or his magic. They were trying to eat something of his, and they were trying to grab him, so his sand went to work and began to slaughter them one by one.

 

Gaara spent over an hour and a half out in the cold of the night, sending his sand out to crush and lance the wraiths still swarming around him, trying to consume him. It was after their number had thinned from over a hundred to a couple dozen that Gaara’s energy had begun to wane. Normally, he would have happily slaughtered thousands over the course of days, but he assumed that his opponents had been siphoning off his chakra or his energy, so after only a measly seventy-nine dementor kills, Gaara was sweating and ready to sit down.

 

Worse yet was that through all of this he still wanted to continue on and kill more and more. He cast a number of more efficient but less carnally satisfying jutsu and escaped the remaining prison guards for the moment. They would pursue him, but the ones he had killed were slowly being replaced from those who had come from miles around to the source of all of this delicious life energy.

 

After flying and then running for about fifteen miles in the expansive forest and killing another half dozen dementors on his way, Gaara was about ready to collapse when he settled in a quiet spot, the last dementor having been dispatched over a mile away.

 

As he rested against a tree, he tried to summon some of Shukaku’s chakra through his seal so that he could restart his fight. He was in no way ready to stop killing tonight, and he could hear the damnable tanuki screaming his ascent from his cell. It would still take a little while for the chakra to clear through the seal without letting the Biju through as well. That would have resulted in a lot more killing for sure, but letting Shukaku free would certainly not improve his mood any.

 

And then he heard a strangely familiar thumping on the grounds and wondered whether one of the forest’s inhabitants had come to end its life, perhaps some of the giant spiders that had begun to avoid him recently, or even a disgruntled centaur. Instead, as it came closer, Gaara remembered the all too memorable sound of a three-headed hell hound closing in on him and his scent.

 

Fluffy had smelled Gaara and come to play. As soon as it was upon Gaara, he/they dove onto their back and wagged their tail before rolling back onto their front looking distinctly like they wanted to lick him.

 

Gaara growled what little sound his throat would allow and he sat down against Fluffy’s rather fluffy underbelly and relaxed a little. The dog(s) continued to pant and wag its/their tail even as Gaara ignored them and used them as a seat.

 

When, after a good long while, no new dementors cropped up, Gaara sat back up and was about ready to go back to the slaughter when he heard the soft whine that signalled a very sad puppy. Fluffy had sat back up and was begging Gaara to stay so, unaccountably, he did. His mood was bad enough but killing hadn’t settled him like it should so he thought giving himself a break might help.

 

He called out his sand and played a game of fetch with the dumb animal, soon learning that he had to throw three logs in the same direction to stop the three heads from fighting each other. Each time they came back, they would proudly drop the logs by his feet and he would repeat, up until the dog(s) tired and laid down in front of him on its back again.

 

Sighing ruefully, Gaara stepped up and started to scratch Fluffy’s belly, a large undertaking in itself, unaccountably feeling better about his failure earlier in the evening, as if playing with the stupid mutt was cheering him up.

 

It just didn’t make sense to Gaara.

 

He continued to play with and train Fluffy for hours more until he decided to give them both a rest, his dark and murderous mood having passed for now. It was only a couple more hours until the day started anyway, so he started the trek back to the castle. The walk would clear the last of the dark thoughts and he could fly the rest of the way when he had missed his first class of the day.

 

He didn’t feel like sitting through Binns’ class this morning. It might not be enough to bring back his temper, but he was feeling a little tired and that class was difficult at times to remain conscious even when he hadn’t spent the night fighting and running around.

 

It wasn’t like the professor would notice, and Draco already knew to answer to the register anyway, so he wouldn’t even be marked absent.

 

 OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

His failure still fresh in his mind, although not as sore as it was the week before, Gaara sat in the school library pouring over yet another tedious book about ancient Welsh runic configurations and their astrological ramifications. Unbelievably dull, and unbelievably the title was longer than the summation. 

 

Gaara’s ongoing boredom (and ever-present frustration) was only exacerbated by the exaggerated sigh that Draco just couldn’t stop himself from releasing, earning a shush from Madame Pince.

 

The aged librarian was one of Gaara’s biggest fans since he was the perfect student in her eyes. He never uttered a word, he never ran around, he never ate or drank over her precious collection, and he seemed to really enjoy books. If only all student could be like Gaara, she thought, glaring pointedly at Lucius and Narcissa’s offspring. The pair of them had been exactly the same when they were pupils here, abusing her library and distracting other students.

 

Of course, no amount of glaring from either side could hurt Draco’s feeling while he despaired over the latest volume of dull research materials. About half an hour before, Draco had huffed and offered to help Gaara with his ‘independent research project’ instead of doing his own homework.

 

The truest sign of a procrastinator: one who will do even more tedious work in order to avoid or postpone their own. Except, the extracurricular assignment Gaara was doing was so boring that Draco was two more sighs away from returning to his own task.

 

“Good evening Gaara. Hello Draco.” Gaara wasn’t easy to sneak up on, but when his nose was stuck within a book that would have summoned Shukaku once upon a time, he didn’t notice Luna who had walked casually through the library and around to his table secluded by one of the stain glass windows.

 

“Hello,” Draco said, his final sigh escaping soon after. He closed the book he had been handed by Gaara only half an hour before and pulled put his own study materials, which read like a children’s picture book in comparison.

 

Gaara nodded to Luna, not sure whether he needed to ‘say’ anything more to his other friend. He decided not to.

 

“You’re reading about advanced ancient rune theory? Would you mind if I joined you?” Luna said, looking far too eager for Draco’s taste. No sane person would volunteer for those books. Ignoring the fact that he had mistakenly made the same offer not so long ago.

 

“Sure. If you would like.” Draco moved his chair a bit to make room for her, and then dropped the book he had failed at in front of her and went back to his homework.

 

“Thank you. I want to study Ancient Runes next year but I don’t have that many books on the subject. Madame Pince won’t let first or second years read too far ahead especially in Runes, so I would love to take a look at the ones you’ve got here.” Luna was happily reading the titles in the pile of books.

 

“Are they really teaching you all of this in your first year of the subject. It’s much more advanced than I would have thought.” She seemed both troubled and excited by the prospect. And perhaps a little suspicious…

 

“Gaara’s doing his own work. He would have fit right in with you ‘Claws.” Draco said. “He gets extra credit for doing all of this advanced theory work,” He leaned a little closer to her and checked that Gaara was still engrossed in his book, “which he needs because his spellcasting is still rubbish.”

 

“Aren’t some of these books from the restricted section?” Luna returned, only for Gaara to look up from his book and silently shush her.

 

Draco wasn’t sure if that was to tell them both to shut up, or if he just didn’t want the librarian to realise her favourite student had been sneaking into the restricted section regularly for more advanced books.

 

“What is he working on?”

 

“Pardon?” Draco asked.

 

“What’s Gaara working on right now? He seems very interested in this project and I would like to help.”

 

“Well… it’s something about this obscure branch of runic configurations that deals with some sort of… mana… mina? Something. He just asked me to read through that book and tell him if it mentioned something called ‘abstracted thuamaturgical mana-morphemes’, or something like that.” You’d think something like that would be hard to miss even in such a big book, but most of it was written in Latin, which was not Draco strongest subject.

 

“I’ve never heard of them, but I’m sure I can find something in one of these books.” Luna dived into the first book and sat very still and stared at page after page, turning the book upside down every once in a while for some reason.

 

It was over an hour later, after Draco had worked on half of his homework, gotten bored and tried helping Gaara again, only to go back to his own work once more, that Gaara instinctively looked up as he sensed someone glaring at him from afar.

 

Fortunately, of the two people it was likely to be in this castle, it was the significantly less dangerous Harry Potter who had just entered the library with his two compatriots. Potter had apparently spotted his red hair immediately upon entering and had elected to give him and Draco the evil eye.

 

The ginger one, the Weasley whose name Gaara couldn’t remember right now, fortunately didn’t see them as that would almost certainly have led to a fight of some sort. Granger, however did follow Harry’s gaze and then proceeded to herd her two hard-headed friends to a table as far away from the two Slytherins (and Luna) as possible, with a stack of books between them too.

 

They stayed for the next hour before Harry and… Ron? Ron and Harry walked out, turning to their table as soon as it was within sight to give them more stink eyes as they left. About twenty minutes later Draco stumbled out of his own chair and to the exit, his brain leaking from his ears.

  
Meanwhile, Luna and Gaara continued their marathon study session through the dry and dusty tomes. Every now and then Luna would surface with a question about some of the advanced principals she was reading about and Gaara would try to explain them as briefly as he could.

 

Sometime later, Draco returned looking refreshed, in his cloak he had hidden some food for the two nerds to eat. He knew Gaara was bookish enough to miss meals when he was engrossed, but he didn’t know about Luna.

 

With a long suffering moan, Draco slumped back into his seat and picked up the slimmest book on the table and continued his futile attempt at helping Gaara with whatever secret project he was working on. He knew Gaara wasn’t doing this as an extra credit assignment for Ancient Runes but he also knew better than to try and pry. He just went with it and tried to help however he could. The frazzled blond wondered if Luna had figured out as much.

 

Gaara eventually looked up as the night wore on, and he marvelled at his two friends sat here with him. They were both unquestionably strange in their own ways, but even Gaara, as dense as Jinchuriki tended to be, knew that he was probably infinitely stranger than the pair combined. Nonetheless, he enjoyed this sort of casual interaction, where they could relax or even laugh in each other’s company.

 

He could never experience anything like this in his own world no matter how much he changed. It wasn’t just his past, but it was the world itself. It was a place of war and of death where children where children were raised to be weapons or, worse yet, monsters.

 

Here, children could stay innocent a little while longer, and war would only be a physical reality for an unlucky minority. Gaara would do anything he could to keep things as they were, and to protect his friends here from experiencing real hardships, and for the adults he called friends he would try to alleviate their ongoing burdens before he left them.

 

He was leaving…

 

Gaara was resolute that he would leave, since no matter how comfortable and peaceful this world was, Suna and his family needed him much more.

 

Until that day came, if it ever came, he would try to live by the example that that idiot set for him.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Harry fumed over his map, irate that Hermione had steadfastly refused to spy on Gaara last night in the library for him. She had said something about how Gaara was having a civilising effect on Malfoy and that he was even helping a second year Ravenclaw with her homework. As if!

 

Once again his enchanted map showed that Gaara was breaking one rule or another, this one being that he was trespassing in one of the towers, the closed one if he remembered correctly. The perfect place to hide his crimes…

 

Since it was a Saturday and before ten in the morning, there was no chance he would be getting any help from Ron within the next hour, and Hermione would stand on principal, so it was down to him to find out what Gaara was hiding.

 

As he walked, he thought back to his lessons with Professor Lupin and how unfair it was that he had to share them with Gaara of all people. Not only was he infuriating and probably evil, but he was so bad at spell work it made him wonder if he was even a wizard. Though, having seen the destruction he could wreak with a wand, Harry had to grant him that Gaara was definitely not a squib. But he was still inept.

 

Even Seamus had never struggled this much.

 

The opening of the infamous Abandoned Tower was surprisingly degraded, like how Harry would have assumed most castle doorways would look after over a thousand years of use. He stepped through the haphazard planks affixed to the frame onto the first of the rickety stones that made him consider returning to his nice, warm and safe Gryffindor tower. However, he was convinced there would be something here: A stash of letters from Sirius Black (in Gaara’s desk), a cache of deadly weapons (in Gaara’s pouch under his bed), explosives (in the same pouch), illegal research (technically not illegal…), or simply a clue to his origins.

 

What he found, after the harrowing climb up the wobbly steps, was any empty and drafty room. There were rotten remnants of furniture but there were no signs of anything being left over by a nefarious Slytherin. Though, Harry noticed as he stepped across the smaller tower, the main room of the structure was not nearly as loose or damaged as he had been led to believe. It was damaged, the hole in the wall testament to that fact, but overall he didn’t think it felt very unsafe at all, unlike the steps leading to it.

 

Grumbling, after half an hour of combing through everything in the tower, he descended back down the steps and went back to the common room to continue his surveillance of Gaara and a number of other people before Hermione could badger him into getting started on his homework. At which point he would ignore his homework for another full day and mess around with Ron for a while. Hermione would huff and join in after a while anyway.

 

He also spent a little time on his own, when he could get away, to practice his Patronus. He knew that even if he were to succeed on his own, without a dementor or even a boggart to use it against, it was little better than a fancy light spell. Still, it at least made him feel like he was doing something consequential.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

“Gaara, stop playing knife games during the lesson, you’re marking the desk.” Professor Sprout said with a quiet sigh, swiftly moving back onto topic. It was a rather dull class this week since they were dealing with a new batch of Puffapods in Greenhouse Number Seven.

 

Gaara looked up at his name being called, thought for a second, and deposited the knife back into his pocket and resumed listening half heartedly to the lecture on dealing with the quite explosive plants. Draco hadn’t even noticed, so used to Gaara’s dangerous antics by now.

 

After class let out, fifteen minutes early since the Hufflepuff two work stations over from Gaara and Draco’s had dropped his seeds and covered the floor with blooming flowers. Sprout had huffed and said that she was fed up with cleaning up Puffapod flowers this week.

 

Draco had loudly postulated that it had probably been Weasley that had the accident last time; him or Longbottom.  

 

Since Herbology had been the last lesson that Wednesday, the students scattered once they were let out. Draco noticed Gaara was flagging behind him, one of the red-head’s favourite tactics for ditching him after classes. Before Gaara could dash away with the crowd covering his escape, Draco caught hold of his baggy robe sleeve and pulled him along to the castle’s entrance. They had a chore to do and Gaara wasn’t weaselling out of it. Again.

 

Draco had already written most of Gaara’s Christmas thank you notes and he was determined that the mannerless cur wouldn’t leave _all_ of it to Draco.

 

When they were back to their room, Draco sat Gaara down at his desk and told him he was going to finish this today. Gaara scowled and thought about escape methods, like knocking Draco out or setting something on fire…

 

He eventually resigned himself to writing out the notes, accepting that it probably was the polite thing to do since he hadn’t sent out any gifts to the people who had sent him presents, as he understood the tradition went. Fortunately, his penmanship was quick and efficient, and he was well on his way within the hour, much to Draco’s appreciation and relief.

 

Draco was doing yet more homework as Gaara worked, the blond former-dilettante’s grades having sky rocketed since his first encounter with his roommate. Soon, he started to chit the chat with his friend.

 

“You said your brother and sister were older than you; how old are they?” Draco was wondering if they were still in school in Gaara’s home country or if they had jobs.

 

Gaara didn’t turn to look at him, nor did he pause in his writing, his sand drifted into the words, ‘Kankuro was sixteen and Temari was seventeen, I think.’

 

“You think?”

 

‘We didn’t start celebrating birthdays until recently.’

 

“Speaking of which, I’ve been meaning to ask (along with a hundred other things) when is your birthday?”

 

‘January 19th, I think.’

 

“What?!” Draco was incredulous. That was only a week away! But more than that, this meant that despite being a good deal shorter than him, Gaara was in fact the older of the pair.

 

Needless to say, Draco didn’t see fit to mention Gaara’s stunted growth in relation to his age.

 

‘As I said, I’ve only just started keeping track. I’m pretty sure it’s the 19th.’

 

“We have to have a party.” Draco said, already formulating in his head what he could put together in such little time. Obviously organising something at the Mansion was out of the question, not nearly enough time to send out formal invitations and get permission to leave the school for a night.

 

‘What? Why?’ This finally got Gaara’s attention away from the growing stack of thank you notes, his mind already dreading the thought of another Malfoy event like the Christmas celebration.

 

Draco sat back in his chair and started jotting down notes, now ignoring Gaara’s growing panic, as he tried to formulate this plan. He ran into a bit of a roadblock when he remembered that he was one of two students at the school that would actually come to a party honouring Gaara, and even his parents who had taken something of a shine to the boy wouldn’t go to a party without some political reason.

 

On a guest list he had in his head, the only names he could think of were him, Luna, and a teacher who appeared to favour Gaara. Worse yet, he couldn’t hold the party in the Slytherin quarters because of the lack of Slytherin support and the outsiders who wouldn’t be allowed to come in.

 

Gaara sighed and went back to his notes. He knew he had no say in this frivolity, and if he was lucky he would be able to skip the party altogether. But since when was he lucky…?

 

After some more scheming and writing notes, Draco resumed his previous line of enquiry, not allowing himself to become distracted now that he had a chance to learn a little about Gaara.

 

“So, your brother and your sister are still in school, back in your home country.” Draco concluded. Unless they finished schooling at sixteen like some other institutions did.

 

Gaara relaxed a little now that they were back to a comfortable subject. ‘No, they both finished when they Temari was twelve and Kankuro was eleven.’

 

“What? How did they finish school when they were so young?” Draco couldn’t imagine it. His schooling had only really begun at that age, the previous education he had received was primarily tutorial based.

 

‘They were very fast studies. Our culture believes in vocational learning. We all graduated but we would then learn on our jobs.’

 

“You all graduated? Do you mean that you finished school in your own country?”

 

‘Yes. I finished at the same time as my siblings. We all worked together.’

 

“What on Earth were you doing? You must have been…” He worked out the difference, “What? Nine, ten?”

 

‘Nine, I think.’

 

“And you started working when you were that old?”

 

‘Yes. We have a very different culture to yours. Although, I finished very early. I have certain ‘gifts’ that helped me to advance.’ Gaara felt a little ill at the prospect of referring to Shukaku as a gift. The demon in him was a gift in the same way that a burning bag of dog poop on one’s stoop could be called one.

 

“But what exactly did you do, you, your brother and a little girl?”

 

Gaara thought for a moment on how best to describe his occupation. Draco knew he was a warrior already, but to admit being one from the age of nine? That might invite uncomfortable questions like when/if he had ever killed. Which led to any number of worse questions.

 

‘We took jobs, with the help of an instructor, which ranged from transporting important documents to guarding places or people.’ The latter was a rare occasion and usually signalled that his father had wanted the subject dead.

 

“So it was a bit like a shared apprenticeship,” Draco concluded. “But I still think it’s positively backwards to finish school when you’re nine and then start working. How can they possibly teach you everything you need to know by then?”

 

‘It is a harder place. We learn what we need to know, and learn the rest in the field.’ Or you died.

 

“Sounds positively barbaric, if you ask me. Where in the world is your home, exactly? Sounds like it’s in the Middle Ages.”

 

‘I don’t quite know. I got sent here (as punishment for his sins) unexpectedly.’

 

This finally grabbed Draco’s full and utmost attention, “Wait, what? What do you mean you were sent here?”

 

‘Someone used a technique to send me here. I don’t know how to return.’

 

Draco was shocked by the fact that Gaara had never seen fit to share that rather important piece of information. Did Dumbledore or Lupin know about this? And then it clicked, a little later than Draco would have been proud to admit: the research Gaara did, the secret research that he did outside of class…

 

The fact that Gaara had been doing covert reading since he had arrived had just been a factor of his abundant eccentricity and not something to pay any particular mind to. “So someone sent you to a foreign country using magic, and you haven’t told anyone?”

 

‘No.’ Other than the mass murderer and his friend. Gaara considered telling Draco about coming from another world, but he hadn’t really intended to tell the boy this much and he didn’t want to overwhelm him. Plus Draco was growing to be quiet inquisitive so he would let his roommate ruminate over the new information for a while.

 

“Why haven’t you asked for help? I’m sure Professor Lupin, or even Professor Dumbledore could help you find your way home or undo the magic that sent you here.”

 

‘I didn’t want to.’

 

Draco’s hand met his forehead, utterly confounded by his brainy friend’s dense personality.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Another rainy Saturday in January, the Golden Trio sat having a heated debate that for once was instigated by Hermione herself, usually the proverbial peacemaker in their group. She had decided that enough was enough and that they (she) needed to address Harry’s recent anger issues.

 

Of course, since she phrased her well-meaning concerns thoughtfully and with a clinical objectivity, Harry reacted by biting her head off…

 

“Quirrel tried to kill me in our first year, with Voldemort on the back of his head,” He continued his rant, Ron flinching noticeably more than Hermione at You-Know-Who’s name, “Then there was Lockhart trying to wipe my brains when I was trying to rescue Ginny from Voldemort again, who almost did kill me that time. With a bloody great big snake! Now I’ve got Sirius Black, my _Godfather_ , out for blood, and Malfoy teaming up with that psychopath Gaara!”

 

Hermione interjected before Harry could build up any more steam, “Well, I don’t know about any of them,” Which she most certainly _did_ , “but Gaara hasn’t done anything wrong, really, has he?”

 

“What about when he attacked Harry?!” Ron shouted.

 

“Harry struck first.” Hermione rebutted.

 

“No I didn’t!”

 

“No he didn’t.”

 

“Yes you did. Gaara had just shoved me with his sand-”

 

“Exactly!” Ron blared.

 

“He only did that because I tried to give him a hug.” Hermione said, still trying to spread reason.

 

“You what? You tried to hug him?!” Harry was rightfully incredulous, even Hermione looked a little embarrassed in hindsight.

 

“Well… he was a new and he was so withdrawn, he reminded me of some of the special needs students at my old primary.”

 

“So you thought you would cuddle him?” Ron didn’t know whether to find this funny or give in to the deep sense of jealous fury within him that he wouldn’t have been able to make sense of until an eventful Christmas Ball the following year.

 

Hermione for her part was fully embarrassed by this point, seeing that her attempt to hug a strange teenager had been naïve to put it mildly.

 

“My point is,” She said forcefully, trying to set that silly moment of hers firmly in the past, “is that Gaara wasn’t to blame and that his fighting you was just the result of a misunderstanding.”

 

“What about him trying to kill Snape?” Harry argued back.

 

“Well, you can hardly blame him there, it’s not like no one else has thought about it.” Ron said, his hand sneaking to the side to find the nearly empty box of Berty-Botts he been emptying for Harry all afternoon.

 

“Snape _did_ antagonise him.” Hermione said.

 

“Well he’s still a prat.” Harry concluded, whether or not he ceded to his bookworm friend’s point about Gaara. “But Sirius Black is still out there looking for a way to get to me.”

 

“Maybe, but that doesn’t mean that you should go out looking for him, Harry. I mean, he _is_ a convicted murderer, you don’t honestly think you could fight him, do you?”

 

Ron, for a change, was speechless as he awaited Harry’s answer.

 

“Well, of course- I don’t know…maybe. Who knows, but if I meet him I will do what my father should have done when he first met that dark bas-”

 

“Harry!” Murderers and betrayals aside, Hermione wouldn’t abide swearing.

 

Sulking a little from being out-argued, Harry stayed quiet as Hermione started on about some rare gossip about a Hufflepuff seventh year who was ‘in trouble.’ As she continued on about how silly the girl was and about the ramifications of it all, he thought back to the best part of his otherwise morose winter break.

 

He had spoken to Lupin a few times in passing since the beginning of the school year, the surprisingly awkward man had seemed to avoid him up to that point, but Harry had persevered and managed to corner Lupin using the map.

 

He had gotten Remus talking eventually after a fair amount of pestering, about his parents and about their group of friends. It visibly pained the professor to talk about not only James and Lily, but about Peter and Sirius also.

 

Harry asked how angry he was at Sirius but he had been woefully disappointed by the answer he had received.

 

“I was angry. I was really angry, for a long time. Once or twice, when it got really bad, when _I_ got really bad, I thought about breaking into Azkaban by myself and doing… something. I don’t even know what I would have done had I managed to confront Sirius, but I imagine it would have ended with both of us dead.

 

“After a few years had passed, I came to a new understanding, Harry. I hated Sirius still, but it was ludicrous. There I was hating everything about him, I refused to use his name, I just referred to him by his hated surname, but then I realised that I- By hating him and denying him, I was further destroying what I had lost.”

 

“I don’t understand.” Harry said, wondering where this digression was heading.

 

Lupin laughed at that, “No, I don’t suppose you do. I’m not explaining myself very clearly am I. Hardly an admirable quality in a professor, I fear. My point, Harry, was that I have so many happy memories of your parents, and Peter, and of Sirius too, and that by blocking out Sirius, I lost a large part of those happy memories. And those were all I had for a long time, for one reason or another.”

 

Lupin was telling the truth, something he regrettably was unable to do a large amount of the time when Harry was concerned. He had lobbied for telling Harry everything from the start, wanting to build bridges between the boy and his godfather from the moment they met, but oddly Sirius had been the voice of reason. He had argued that there was no proof that he was innocent, and any words to the contrary from one of his old school friends would simply leave them with no tangible link to Harry.

 

“But Professor, I don’t have any memories. Thanks to _him_ and to Voldemort,” Lupin was ashamed to admit he flinched a little, “so I don’t think I can forgive him or not hate him every bit as much as he deserves.”

 

“No, I suppose not,” The older man sighed. “No matter how much I cherish the memories I have from school, I don’t know that I can ever forgive your parents’ killer either.” Pettigrew would pay, that was for sure.

 

“Now, enough of all of this dark talk.” Lupin said, forcing down his own dark impulses for the impressionable youth’s benefit. “I have some rather tasty cakes from the kitchens and I might even have a few photos of your parents you might like to see.” He would have to have some copies made up of them since he couldn’t bring himself to part with the precious few pictures he had of his friends, even for Harry.

 

“That sounds nice.” Harry had said, eager for any more morsels of experience he might garner about his mum and dad. And cake. Cake was good too.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

It was Monday and Slytherin had only a couple of weeks left until their scheduled rematch against the Gryffindorks, so tensions were high and the pressure on Draco as Seeker was at an all time high. He contented himself with the knowledge that Potter was receiving even more from his Quidditch obsessed House.

 

“Good morning Draco.” Luna had a very disconcerting way of appearing when people least expected her, which was sadly all of the time. Nonetheless, Draco wasn’t about to snub a pureblood who was, unaccountably, a friend of a friend.

 

“Good morning, Luna.” Draco thought his obligation was fulfilled and walked briskly away, heading in the general direction of the Quidditch field since his practice was supposed to start in twenty minutes.

 

“Do you have any plans for Gaara’s birthday yet?” Luna asked, again surprising Draco as she spoke from his blind spot.

 

“Where did you hear about his that?” It wasn’t as if Draco had been going around spreading the news.

 

“He told me about it.” Her shorter legs kept pace admirably with Draco’s stride.

 

“Wait, when did Gaara tell you about his birthday?” His gait had almost faltered, but instead it just slowed to regular walking speed since he obviously wasn’t going to lose her.

 

“Oh, a couple of months ago, I think. I hadn’t known him for very long so I asked him when it was.” The simplicity of it stung a bit. For the umpteenth time, his truly British neuroses stood in the way of discovery.

 

Thinking for a second, Draco eventually overcame his incredulity and booted up again, “Um, yes, I was thinking about booking one of the back rooms in the Hogs Head in Hogsmeade. Gaara will need a teacher to accompany him since he doesn’t have permission from any parents, so we would invite Professor Lupin. That’s all really.”

 

Needless to say, Draco hadn’t gotten very far in his party plans. He apparently didn’t have his mother’s flare for the task.

 

“That sounds lovely, I think Gaara will like that very much. Hopefully, with Professor Lupin there as well, they won’t mind me going either.”

 

“Pardon?”

 

“I’m only a second year, so I’m not allowed to go to Hogsmeade yet. And it’s a Wednesday, so I think I don’t know if they will let me come.”

 

Draco wanted to slap himself for the obvious oversight. “Of course, right, yes. I’m sure Lupin will be able to swing it. Just to be safe, though, try to clear it with Professor Flitwick first. Tell him that it is the first Birthday Gaara’s celebrating away from his family.” A little guilt trip couldn’t hurt.

 

“Are you going to ask Professor Snape for Gaara?”

 

“No! Everyone in Slytherin knows better than to mention Gaara’s name to Snape. He’ll never know about any of it. Lupin will go straight to Dumbledore, I expect.”

 

“It’s quite curious, that Snape seems to hate Gaara so much. Do you know why?”

 

“No one is quite sure,” Draco said, recalling a number of fruitless conversations, “Gaara least of all. One of the upper years said it was probably because Snape’s been in a particularly bad mood this year for some reason and that Gaara just got caught in the crosshairs. Plus Gaara can be very frustrating.”

 

“I did notice a strong concentration of Wrackspurts around his head this year, Professor Snape’s I mean, but they have been stirred up into a frenzy ever since the dementors surrounded the school this summer so I didn’t think much of it.” Luna seemed even more quizzical than she usually did as she mulled over this connection.

 

Draco almost fell into the trap of asking what Wrackspurts were, but remembered in time what he had heard of Luna ‘Looney’ Lovegood. Namely: she believed in a number of nonsensical and imaginary creatures. Not wanting to be drawn into either a pointless debate or some ridiculous explanation, he let it drop and soon enough he had arrived at the Quidditch field.

 

While Luna seemed to play by different general rules than the rest of humanity, even she wasn’t likely to follow him into the boy’s changing room. 

 

In place of a farewell, Luna said, “I’m glad Gaara is friends with you. He has sad eyes and I think you’re helping him. He’s a nice person and you are too, even if you both don’t realise it.”

 

Then she turned on her heels and began skipping back up the corridor they had just walked down. Draco didn’t bother shouting anything after her, instead thinking over what she had said. It had been strange as most things she said were, but also oddly insightful.

 

Still, for a pureblood she was far too scatty and clingy, but at least her interests or affections weren’t directed at him. Gaara had the blissful virtue of obliviousness.

 

The red-head in question, who had come to hope that Draco had dropped the subject of his birthday celebrations after his total lack of interest and other friends became apparent, was on one of his all too frequent trips through the woods to see Sirius.

 

Gaara longed for the warm summer days where Sirius could hunt and scavenge for his own food instead of having it supplied via surly ninja. Well, there was also the fact that Gaara hated and would always hate the snow and all cold weather. Sirius was in the Shack as he always was, acting like a dog in the most inappropriate way when Gaara walked in.

 

In short order, Padfoot transformed back into Sirius, presumably so that he could actively give Gaara the silent treatment. What the immature escaped convict always failed to appreciate was that Gaara was perfectly happy sitting in silence with his friends (a very recent pluralism).

 

After thirty minutes, in which Sirius had edged over, snatched the sack that Gaara had set down between them, and begun to devour the food that Gaara had brought with him; Sirius finally cracked and shouted: “I can’t believe you gave away the broom!”

 

Gaara sighed and continued stared at him long and hard, having explained his actions half a dozen times since Sirius found out.

 

“You couldn’t have given it to a Gryffindor, you had to give it to a bloody Slytherin Seeker!”

 

Having gone through this enough times now, Gaara knew his participation was not required, so he let Sirius continue monologuing until he ran out of breath. Of course, the diatribe included liberal uses of his alias ‘Lily’, and a couple of veiled insults at his placement in Slytherin.

 

Things took a different turn before Sirius could tire himself out when his angry rant about the House of Snakes turned to a self-pitying one about the upcoming rematch between Gryffindor and Slytherin and how Sirius wasn’t going to be able to go and watch.

 

He whined and sulked and bemoaned his poor luck, not to be able to freely go and see his godson _beat_ Slytherin properly. He wouldn’t even be able to cheer Harry on, which was SO UNFAIR since Harry was already disadvantaged by Malfoy’s brat having a state of the art broom.

 

Gaara wanted to ignore Sirius’ blatant attempts at manipulation, but he knew that would only lead to the man going on forever. God forbid Draco won the match…

 

‘Fine. I’ll help you sneak in.’ It was much harder to sneak anything past the dementors since their numbers had been bolstered, so he would need to think of something especially clever… and preferably uncomfortable for the immature mutt.

 

Predictably, the grown man’s mood perked right up in a flash and he was back to his old self, moving straight onto a new subject. Gaara thought, as he constantly did, about causing him some physical harm but decided not to since the matter was closed and he didn’t want the man-child becoming grumpy again.

 

“So, you know how I’ve been following that strange smell in the forest lately?” Sirius asked. Gaara did not, since he routinely tuned out the man/dog’s talk of scents and other animalistic exploits. Some of it struck too close to home.

 

When Gaara failed to nod or answer he continued regardless, “I finally caught up to it and you’ll never guess what I found! It was a bloody great big dog, with three heads!”

 

Gaara paused in turning the sausages on a spit over the fire, and looked at Sirius.

 

“I know! Three heads! The worst part is that when I told Moony about it, he said he already knew it was there. One of Hagrid’s old pets or something, apparently.” Sirius was so excited it was hard to keep the grin off of Gaara’s face. He did wonder why Lupin was spending so much time in the forest on his own, but chalked it up to taking frequent strolls on his own, as he liked to do.

 

“It has to be at least twice the size of the Shack,” Which Fluffy wasn’t, “and was fiercely territorial when I met it, but I was able to get it to submit easily enough.” Somehow Gaara doubted that Fluffy had been anything but annoyingly friendly to a strange dog.

 

A lot of his visits were whirlwind drop offs when he was mostly stopping by to give Sirius some food or clean drinking water, but that night Gaara spent hours there, being talked at by the man who had gone twelve years without a friendly ear to talk off.

 

Gaara saw Sirius at least once a week, and he knew that Remus went to visit twice as often as that, which would have more than fulfilled Gaara’s quota for social interaction if he were the one stuck out in the crumbling shack in the dead of winter. However, Sirius, despite the time he spent in abject loneliness, was fundamentally a social creature and Gaara could see that he wanted to be around people more.

 

It helped that Sirius wasn’t at all subtle about it, further evidenced by his repeating the offer he had made some time ago to take Gaara in once he was free and cleared of all charges. Gaara was thankful, but he didn’t know if either of them would survive living in close proximity again. When Sirius had been looking after his wounded body in the summer, Gaara had been too injured to beat him to death.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

When the morning of the nineteenth dawned, Gaara was dreading what his friend might have planned for him, but even after Draco had woken up he gave no recognition of the date other than that it was a Wednesday. Thankful but no less suspicious, Gaara waited all day for an utterance of ‘Happy Birthday’ or some such frivolity.

 

Wednesday’s classes ended as they always did, with Gaara slowly ambling out of one of the Herbology greenhouses trying not to touch any of the dangerous looking (or sounding) plants that reminded him of his brother’s own toxic greenhouse. Each and every time Gaara found himself in that class surrounded by the myriad of flora, he unerringly asked himself ‘What’s wrong with a simple cactus garden?’

 

By this point in the day, after having been with Draco for hours, and having seen Lupin and Luna in DADA and the Great Hall respectively, he still hadn’t gotten so much as a mention of the day, so he thought he might be spared the indignity.

 

As Draco and he were approaching the Dungeons they ran into Professor Lupin, looking rather more angry than either was used to seeing from the placid teacher.

 

“Gaara, you need to follow me,” He said, addressing only the red-head without the barest hint of joviality in his voice. “Now.”

 

“What is this about, sir?” Draco asked, his impetuous disregard for the man’s authority continuing even still.

 

“This doesn’t concern you Draco, the Headmaster needs to talk to Gaara.” Lupin turned and walked away back up the stairs without checking if Gaara would follow. The bewildered foreigner did indeed follow his trusted friend and teacher up the steps, wondering all the while what this could be about. He had been pretty good recently, and the things he _had_ done he had been pretty good about hiding.

 

Maybe they had finally worked out that he was killing the dementors, or that he had been sneaking out of the grounds regularly since the year began. Or, well… there were certainly more than a couple of reasons for calling him to see the principal, but he didn’t think they actually knew about any of them.

 

Maybe he was getting sloppy… but then, in his mind, his gruesome and bloody murders back in his village had been sophisticated assassinations. Gaara had never been as underhanded or subtle as he’d like to believe, according to his siblings.

 

The journey from the lowest quarters to one of the highest towers of Hogwarts had been entirely silent until Lupin spoke the Gryphon statue’s facile password and started on the spiral staircase to the Headmaster’s office.

 

Gaara was in his mind trying to think of as number of strategies centring on denial, evasion, or, if need be, escape. If they had, by some dint of magic or miracle, been clued in on what Gaara was or what he was doing, he would have to clear the way and escape from the tower somehow. Easier said than done when all he had in his pocket was a handful of sand for talking.

 

Just as his hand was trailing towards the pocket where he carried the one kunai he felt he could reasonably conceal on his person, the heavy wooden door swung open.

 

“Surprise!” Chorused Luna, Draco, Dumbledore, and Lupin behind him, sending his nerves into overdrive and he performed a very un-shinobi-like flinch instead of throwing the knife at the person directly in front of him. Though, considering that person happened to be Draco, the likely mastermind of this ruse, he would have considered it justifiable homicide.

 

His eye twitching with pent-up anger, he allowed himself to be guided into the well endowed office by the smirking Lupin.

 

“I hope you don’t mind, but the surprise part of this evening was my brainchild.” Lupin muttered, snickering all the while.

 

“Happy Birthday.” Draco cheered, followed in short course by the other blonde and Dumbledore and Lupin.

 

The withheld stress sagged off of Gaara’s put-upon shoulders, and he was ushered into the office, happily noting that at least they hadn’t covered the place in gaudy decorations or commissioned some hideously sweet cake.

 

“I know it’s not exactly orthodox, but since I have permission from Ms Lovegood’s father, and Professor Lupin is willing to take responsibility for Gaara because of his unique circumstances, I couldn’t see any reason to deny Draco’s request to hold a birthday party off of school property.” Albus said with a wide smile to all present.

 

Of course, none of that was true. It was entirely against the rules, but since he _did_ have permissions and a responsible (?) teacher accompanying them all, and since Lucius had covertly threatened to start up trouble with the other governors again this year; he had agreed. He had been a little wary of sending three children out with only one minder when there was a mass murderer roaming the area, but if they did nothing else, the presence of the dementors would ensure a short outing would be a safe as possible.

 

Part of Albus was indignant at the manipulation, especially since it had blatantly come from the fourteen year old Malfoy. However, like most of the changes this year, he saw it as a positive step on Draco’s part, to be using his irrevocable Slytherin tendencies for someone else’s benefit.

 

While he wouldn’t deny the precedent amongst the Snakes towards the Dark end of the moral spectrum, he did not buy into the prejudice that all of them were Dark Lords in the making, or Death Eaters in training. They just needed that extra bit of encouragement towards the Light. Hence his enthusiastic backing of Gaara, despite all of the associated troubles.

 

Gaara was wondering what Dumbledore had meant when he mentioned leaving the school. He would have felt dread at the thought of being dragged to some stuffy function at the Malfoy Manor, but he knew without a shadow of a doubt that Draco wouldn’t let him near his parents without fixing his uniform. Gaara’s top button was undone, his tie was loose, his shirt was untucked, and if Draco shouted ‘Malfoy Manor’ in the floo they were lighting, he would undo his fly just to mess with the Malfoy(s).

 

Instead, to his moderate relief, Draco announced that they would all be going to the Hogshead Pub in Hogsmeade. The blond went first, followed closely by Luna, who looked about as lively and cheerful as Gaara had ever seen her, and last went Lupin with Gaara, holding tightly onto him so that they would not be separated in the floo network.

 

The landing was not as bumpy as the last time Gaara used a fireplace to travel, but he would never understand the complacency of the average witch or wizard who were willing to abide with these ridiculous modes of travel. Surely someone could have thought of SOMETHING in the long and illustrious line of magic in this world.

 

When he regained his senses, he found himself in the exact setting he did not want to be in, namely he was in a private room in the Hogshead and there was a banner with his name and celebratory references to his birthday, there were a load of balloons, there were a few birthday hats on the tables along with drinks and party foods. It was ludicrous, especially considering that there were four of them in the room and one of them was a grown man.

 

Gaara covertly asked Draco why they were at the pub, a setting that surely would have caused no small amount of trouble to organise, but Draco said that they couldn’t possibly celebrate properly in the school. What the rich boy didn’t say was that he would have liked to hire out a much nicer venue for Gaara, but his resources and time were limited.

 

No matter the small number, everyone (except the grumpy birthday boy) had a wonderful night, all swiftly taking their places around the table and telling funny stories, often including and ridiculing Gaara. For his part, the red-head stayed to the side, repeatedly getting pulled back towards the joviality when he strayed too close to the door.

 

It was only as the clock struck nine-thirty that Lupin conspicuously let him wander to the exit. Gaara figured the man had taken mercy on the recluse and was letting him go early without interrupting the otherwise surprisingly rowdy party. What he found outside was not what he had been expecting.

 

Next to the door, sat Padfoot with a wagging tail and a gift crudely wrapped in old newspaper. He knelt down, knowing that the convict couldn’t risk transforming near the village anymore, and took the slobbery gift from Sirius.

 

He would have felt a tug at his heart, were it not for the fact that when he unwrapped the newspaper he found a dead rabbit and a small note saying:

 

‘ _Lily,_

_You can give this one to the Slytherin too, if you want._

_Padfoot._ ’

 

Grimacing at the thing, he gently flicked Padfoot’s nose, ceasing the amused tail wagging momentarily until he tossed the rabbit back for Sirius to run and catch in his jaws. The dog-man would undoubtedly have more use for the thing than Gaara (or Draco, for that matter).

 

Sirius came back and dropped the rabbit _on_ Gaara’s feet, silently requesting a game of catch. Gaara patiently waited for Sirius to drop his ears, stoop down and take the rabbit back off of his shoes, not willing to indulge in a game of catch-the-dead-rabbit just now.

 

Draco poked his head out of the door into the cold night just as Gaara was kneeling down in front of Padfoot. “Come back in Gaara,” He cut himself off when he saw the improbable sight of his stoic, perhaps homicidal, friend, kneeling down in the cold patting a (ripe smelling) stray dog on the head. “And don’t forget to wash your hands.”

 

His sneer towards Padfoot earned him a fierce growl from the large dog, which caused the pompous blond to duck right back into the pub. Gaara patted Sirius one more time before going back himself, appreciating the gesture, however mocking, of Sirius giving him one of his precious rabbits.

 

Sirius barked and then ran off into the night, presumably back to the Shack where he could try and get warm. Gaara walked inside, also enjoying getting out of the freezing cold, and went promptly to the bathroom to wash his hands of the contaminant of smelly dog and dead rabbit.

 

As he let himself back into the private function room, he found Draco telling a story about the time he had ruined all of the good linen before his sixth birthday party and all of the trouble he had gotten into.

 

Luna was the first to notice his re-entry, “Oh, we were just telling stories of our past birthdays.”

 

Draco, who had been interrupted before her could finish his own story (cutting out a large portion of physical retribution for his carelessness), was a little put out when she suggested Gaara tell a story now.

 

Gaara thought for a moment, as anyone who knew him would say he did whenever he was about to share some detail of his past, before he nodded minutely and summoned his sand, ‘I have only celebrated one birthday before this, last year. My brother and sister cooked food and told stories, like tonight. It was nice.’

 

“Hold on a minute there, Gaara, did you say that you’ve never had a birthday before?” Lupin asked.

 

‘No, no one was thankful I was alive until last year.’ The blank, matter of fact expression on Gaara’s face would have inspired pity in any group that didn’t include a recently self-hating aristocrat, a chronically lonely, closeted werewolf, and a girl who had witnessed her own mother’s death and was regularly called Looney to her face.

 

Nonetheless, it did dampen the mood a tad until madam Rosemerta barged into the room with a tray of drinks that looked far too interesting to be for the school group. Her smile dropped when she looked at the small gathering, “Oh, I am sorry my loves, I thought you were the bachelor party next door. Not to worry.”

 

As she bustled back out of the door, Lupin jumped up and grabbed the rather large glass of Fire Whisky off of the tray without her even noticing, sitting back with a quiet sigh.

 

None of the other party-goers wanted to question aloud the wisdom of a teacher openly stealing and drinking alcohol in front of the three children he was supposed to be watching (and guarding from the big bad mister Sirius Black who, at the particular moment, had just arrived at the Shrieking Shack and was scratching himself behind the ear with his foot.)

 

Luna was just finishing her story about her seventh birthday, which had been very happy since she actually had guests come to it, when Lupin was coming to the end of his drink. As it turned out, Remus Lupin was a bit of a lightweight, not that he would ever admit to such an un-masculine weakness.

 

Still, none of the minors complained. Gaara in no way considered himself a child in need to a chaperone, so as an adult he took no issue with looking after his friend. Luna didn’t mind either, though no one would be able to tell why. She just didn’t seem to feel unsafe in the slightest. Draco, who once upon a time would have called for a government investigation of Hogwarts at the first inkling of a professor who partook let alone to excess in front of his charges, but now…

 

Draco had stopped caring about a lot of things. Besides their individual damages, the three teenagers easily forgave the unacceptable behaviour since the otherwise sombre and (sporadically) professional professor had lightened up considerably with the application of alcohol. It was both a relief to see him loosen up and funny to watch it happen.

 

Lupin’s inebriation led to a few stories of the man’s own, about his and his friends’ various birthday exploits, including the infamous Sirius Black.

 

Gaara quite liked seeing the uptight man finally let loose, and as his state progressed, Luna continued to be unfazed by her professor’s drunken state and actually found his tales funny. Draco’s reaction, on the other hand, varied from disgust (more at the stories’ content than any judgement he might level at the drunk teacher) to embarrassed anger when Lupin started telling the story of how Sirius had decided the perfect gift for first-year James’ birthday would be all of Lucius Malfoy’s underwear.

 

The previous Malfoy scion had been pompus beyond belief from the start, and had become a pain in the rear for every Gryffindor since he was made head boy by the time the Marauders had started at Hogwarts. While not the devoted son he once was, Draco still had to make a harsh remark about the fact that both of the participants in the story had become either a convicted criminal or, worse yet, Potter’s father.

 

“Actually Draco, I was the one who distracted your father for the evening while Sirius stole all of his undergarments, and a good deal of his homework as well now that I think about it.” Lupin cackled. Gaara couldn’t wait to tell Sirius about witnessing Lupin’s infantile alcohol tolerance.

 

‘I think we should call it an evening since we all have classes tomorrow.’ Gaara wrote, standing to help Lupin to the fireplace.

 

“Yes, I suppose you are right. It’s a shame though. Professor Lupin tells some very funny stories.” Luna said.

 

“Thank you, Draco.” Lupin said, looking at Luna.

 

Draco led the way to the fireplace, having been given permission to floo back into Dumbledore’s office, even in the night.

 

‘Floo over and check if Dumbledore is there.’ Gaara spelled out, supporting Lupin’s weight with apparent ease. He really was a lightweight, in both meanings.

 

“What? Why?” Draco demanded.

 

‘I don’t wish to parade a drunk teacher in front of his boss.’

 

Satisfied, Draco went ahead and confirmed that the coast was clear, Dumbledore clearly having trusted Lupin to escort his charges back to school after the headmaster had gone to sleep. “Come on through, but be quiet.”

 

The three remaining in the Hogshead had to cram into the fireplace together since one was too drunk to command the floo and Gaara didn’t feel like getting left behind. All too soon, they were thrown out in Dumbeldore’s office and quietly letting themselves out through the door with the hope that the crash the trio had sounded off hadn’t awoken the slumbering wizard.

 

Gaara headed towards Lupin’s quarters while Draco escorted Luna to the nearby Ravenclaw tower’s entrance.

 

When they were ascending the small staircase at the back of the DADA classroom, towards Remus’ suite, the man piped up after having gone through a series of short naps on the way. “Happy birthday Lily.”

 

Gaara did not know which he resented more, the birthday sentiment forced on him, the hated and all-too familiar nickname, or that his friend and trusted teacher was drunk. Still, Gaara would let the latter slide this time since he knew Lupin had his own troubles. For whatever reason, the kind and outgoing man had been alone most of his life before and after his time in Hogwarts, so being invited to a party must have been strange and upsetting.

 

Not that Gaara could relate at all.

 

He dumped Lupin on his bed and made his way to his own bed, stopping by the kitchens on the way to ask a nervous elf, already starting on breakfast, to send a wake up call for Remus before his classes started for the day. With any luck, no one but those present at the party would ever know that Remus had been so irresponsible.

 

Just as long as the man didn’t start up drinking like professor Trelawney.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

The Quidditch game was dry this time around, which was about the only positive word to be said about the late January weather. At least when there was rain they could huddle under shelter and their feet wouldn’t need to be shifted every few minutes for fear of freezing to the ground.

 

Gaara was dangerously close to tearing off a little of the stadium and starting a little fire in the sand igloo he had constructed. The heavy sand structure, sat atop one of the watching towers, was surrounded by two dozen perturbed wizards who didn’t appreciate the space Gaara was taking up with his ridiculous ‘spell.’

 

They might have started up again with those annoying complaints if Gaara did actually start a fire in there.

 

That, and since Padfoot was also cramped into the bubble of sand, they would have needed an extension before they could start adding amenities. They were lucky enough to be seated at the front of the viewing box, so they could have an open viewing window without fear of anyone peering in and spotting the shaggy black dog sat with Hogwarts’ resident sociopath.

 

It had been very entertaining, explaining to Sirius the method he planned to employ to sneak the dog into the stadium, right past the dementors, the aurors, and the professors. He had coated himself in a thicker than usual layer of his sand to free up room inside of his gourd, where had had crammed the large dog and sealed it back up.

 

Of all the ways anybody could have guessed Sirius Black might sneak in to the school Quidditch match of the year, Gaara doubted any of them could have possibly imagined the man would have been shoved into a cramped gourd filled the rest of the way with sand and carried on the back on a fourteen… make that, fifteen year old waif of a student.

 

That train of thought brought up an uncomfortable truth that distracted him entirely from the first ten minutes of the match, so caught up in his depressed obsessive musings. He was easily the shortest boy in their year now, his already compact frame having been overtaken by even those boys whose birthday’s fell in the summer. The number of girls shorter than him in their age bracket was fast declining as well.

 

It was a sore point, that Gaara had not grown a millimetre since he had started in September, and Draco, Sirius and Remus had learned not to bring it up, even in good fun. Call him Lily, mock his spellcasting or strange cultural ways, but mention any height related topic at one’s own peril.

 

He was only drawn out of his internal ravings when his idiot companion started barking, a doggy way of cheering Harry along as he dodged bludgers left and right. Gaara slapped him on the nose, as he understood was the way to discipline a (dumb) disobedient hound. Somehow, even knowing it was the incorrigible escapee inside, it didn’t feel right slapping a dog around the back of the head.

 

The game was intense from the start, as far as Gaara understood the game. There was no time for the players to sit around waiting for the Snitch or the Quaffle to go to them, they were chasing the various balls all over the sky from the moment the whistle blew. What would have otherwise been an impressive game was even more intense thanks to the addition of the Seekers both riding their new Firebolts. By the time the Bludgers came near either of them, they were at the other side of the stadium.

 

And still, each time Draco checked Harry or Slytherin overtook Gryffindor in points, Sirius would turn his snout to Gaara and showcase something Gaara refused to describe as a look of derision.

 

Draco kept Harry busy for a long while as the other players waged their desperate battle for points, their Firebolts shortenings the skill gap between the two players. Both sides were desperate for victory in this match since the pressure had only mounted since their previous attempt had ended in a draw.

 

In short, it was a battle for honour, or so Draco had said repeatedly over the past month and a half. Gaara wasn’t sure Draco knew what that word meant.

 

All in all, though, at least it was an energetic game, which it occurred to Gaara might have been to ward off the cold. It was bad enough in his little sand cottage with another warm body to heat the place, he didn’t want to think how could the players must be suspended in the freezing wind with nothing but their heating charms to ward of the hypothermia.

 

Slytherin had reached a spectacular seventy point lead when the whistle blew and everyone looked around wondering why the match had been paused, only to find Madame Hooch hovering by Harry, the Golden Snitch in his outstretched hand. Apparently in all of the frantic zooming, Harry had snatched the Snitch out of the sky, while Draco was floating at the other side of the stadium, having overshot it by a hundred metres in a couple of seconds.

 

Gaara’s hand shot out to clamp over Sirius snout as soon as he spied Harry with the Snitch, pre-empting the howl that then tried to worm its way out of Sirius’ forcibly shut mouth. The dog whined and Gaara let go, letting him pant and wag his tail happily, letting out a few excited but quiet ‘whuffs.’

 

Gaara would have liked to have been able to stay and offer some emotional support for Draco after he had lost the important match, but he had to sneak Sirius back out into the wilderness. Well… he wouldn’t have liked it, but he felt he should have been there to do it. Nonetheless, his duty to keep Sirius out of Azkaban for now.

 

Emotional crap later. Much later.

 

That said, now he had to deal with the unbearably smug dog-turned-man. One squeeze and he would be carrying dog slush rather than the man who drive him insane for the next few weeks, inside of his gourd. It would be so very easy…

 

He dumped the dog out into the Shack before turning and leaving immediately, not waiting to hear whatever Sirius had been howling in dog form all along. It was a long walk back into the school grounds and he had dementors to slaughter. He actually didn’t know what he would do if he managed to kill all of those ugly wraiths. Maybe go after those big spiders?

 

When Gaara got back to his room, he had to wonder whether being around Sirius would have been as hellish as trying to comfort Draco after he had lost Slytherin the pivotal match against their hated rivals. He refused to leave his room for two days, which was conveniently over the weekend, before Gaara got bored and decided to act.

 

Draco had been wallowing in self pity and avoiding the inevitable scorn he was to receive from his housemates when Gaara re-entered their room carrying something wrapped in cloth. He didn’t pay it much mind, contemplating whether he could persuade his parents to transfer him to Durmstrang. Better that than face his House who already had their doubts about his position. He hadn’t heard anyone call him a blood traitor yet, but he imagined there were whispers.

 

He was about to say some harsh and unwarranted things to his roommate, when Gaara pulled the House Cup out of his extra cloak. Draco blinked slowly, set his head back down on his pillow, and thought…

 

“What?!” Draco jumped back up from his bed at speeds that might have won him the Quidditch match had he been so motivated at the time. “What are you doing with that?! Where did you even get the House Cup?”

 

Gaara looked down at the shiny trophy and wondered if he had miss-stepped somewhere along the line. ‘The trophy room.’

 

“Gaara, you can’t just steal it!” Draco couldn’t believe he was still surprised by his friend’s shenanigans.

 

‘You don’t want it?’

 

“Just put it back before someone notices it’s missing!”

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Gaara could never have guessed that his life would devolve into him marking time with the lunar calendar and the humiliating and dangerous transformations that accompanied it. He was fortunate that it drew no untoward attention to keep careful track of the moon’s waxing and waning, their Astronomy classes providing the perfect excuse.

 

He had decided that the continuing freezing weather and brief moments of nudity out in the open Winter air were good enough reasons to run the risk of transforming in the castle again. Also, he had realised how terrifying the thought of Sirius discovering his fluffy form was. How much of a kick would that man-child get out his debilitating… peculiarity. The endless mockery and teasing, the animal nickname he was sure to receive. Then again, he supposed any nickname based on his mini demon tanuki form would be better than ‘Lily.’

 

The final reason he had decided to take the enormous risk was that it looked like is was going to rain that night and he didn’t feel like getting soaking wet in either of his bodies. His clothes were uncomfortable enough, having been left in the biting cold all night, it didn’t bear thinking about being caught in a downpour.

 

Of course, should the opportunity arise to run out in the open, if the rain held off, Gaara would enjoy a bit of fresh air around the perimeter of the castle. The only danger there being Hagrid, and he could hear the oaf coming from a mile off with his human ears, so there was no chance whatsoever that the half-giant would be sneaking up on him with his sensitive (and pointy) animal ears.

 

The transformation was quick and painless after the moon had risen, so Gaara picked up his discarded clothes and hid them under a desk in the abandoned classroom and settled down with his book until the students disappeared for the evening. The Winter evenings were long and frustrating for the nocturnal creatures of the castle, but Gaara was experienced in killing time, among other things, so he had prepared for his wait with a heavy book.

 

When he was free to roam, he took pleasure in the sounds of clicking his claws made on the polished stone floor as well as the feel of the air against his fur when he managed to get up to full speed in the wide corridors.

 

He ran all about the school, having a few close calls with the staff patrolling the corridors before they too turned in for the night, and then he moved outside between showers to enjoy the night air properly.

 

He also took a few moments out of his busy schedule to go and harass the man chickens in the school coops, which did _not_ look delicious. It was somehow hilarious watching the poultry getting flustered, yet another animal predilection he didn’t plan to dwell on.

 

It was as he had finished tormenting the otherwise affectionate birds that he turned back around to return to the castle and noticed that he was floating about a foot off of the ground…

 

He was being levitated! How undignified…

 

He turned about in the air frantically, hoping to break free of the magical hold somehow, or at least catch a glimpse of who had caught him. And catch a glimpse he did. Of all the people, he supposed it could have been worse considering all of his enemies in this world, but nonetheless, seeing Luna stood there with her wand controlling his movement was not a great comfort.

 

The second year was smiling excitedly, even more than she had at his birthday party, as she drew his twisting and fidgeting body towards her.

 

Luna had been waiting for the like fluffy creature all night because she had worked out that he appeared on the full moon, but last month she hadn’t been at the castle to search for the fascinating and adorable animal.

 

She dropped Gaara into her waiting arms and held on tightly under his armpits as he squirmed to get free. He might have been able to escape, but he didn’t know if he could get her to release him without hurting her with his tail or claws, and then he didn’t know if he could run away fast enough to avoid any subsequent spells. For the moment, he would have to bide his time.

 

With that in mind, he relaxed and hung limply in her arms, feeling even more ridiculous than he imagined her looked. He was a proud shinobi, he housed a demon in his body, he had killed hundreds of men women and children, and now he was a furry tanuki being carried by a thirteen year old girl like some stray pup.

 

And Draco questioned why he had anger issues.

 

“I’ve been trying to find you since November, you see. You’re very fast when you get running, but you were quite distracted with those chickens, weren’t you?” Luna chatted inanely, as he was wont to do at all times. She totally ignored and bouts of struggling or starling that the ‘wild animal’ in her arms might go through as she walked.

 

It further irked the seasoned warrior that Luna was able to carry him up flight after flight of stairs without any real strain. He knew it wasn’t his own body, but it still smarted that his size was so slight.

 

“I have two friends with red-hair, like the fur on your head. Well, I have two friends overall I suppose. Except if you counted Draco Malfoy, but I don’t think he likes me very much. No, I have Ginny Weasley and Gaara. He doesn’t have a surname, I don’t think.” She had continued upwards the whole time, towards Ravenclaw tower, if Gaara’s guesses were correct. He would wait for her to put him down and then make a run for it.

 

“I went to Draco’s Christmas party, mind you, but that was just because Gaara asked. It would have been nice if Ginny could have come, but I don’t know if she would have liked Draco’s house. Draco’s father tried to set a rabid Heliopath on her once, on the order of the Minister for Magic, but she was saved by a King House Elf and Harry Potter.”

 

She had answered the baffling riddle to enter her House and walked on up the stairs to her bedroom. It struck Gaara as somewhat unfair that, despite being quite a bit smaller than the Slytherin rooms, the Ravenclaws were given single rooms to themselves. Maybe it addressed the Houses specific needs, with the ‘Claws studying on their own, the Snakes building a few important alliances, the Gryffindors building teams, and the ‘Puffs…?

 

Maybe Rowena Ravenclaw had just had first pick of areas of the castle.

 

What Gaara had failed to account for in his terribly clever plan of escape was that as soon as he was dumped onto Luna’s bed, she had quickly walked back to her bedroom door and locked it. It was only a simple latch, but Gaara’s big puffy paw-digits would struggle immensely to unlatch it and get out all before Luna had time to stop him.

 

Plan B it was then. Wait for her to fall asleep.

 

At least she didn’t seem to have any plans to torture him or, worse, play games with him. If he heard the word ‘fetch’ he might have reconsidered his nonviolence.

 

She would eventually fall asleep, being only thirteen and having school the next morning, but until then he would have to suffer through her inane prattling which he could normally run away from after he got tired of it.

 

“I asked Professor Flitwick for a lock on my door after I kept losing all of my school books. I always got them back but it was very time consuming trying to find them all. I got something for you over the break. I think I put it in here somewhere.” Luna had started rummaging through her trunk.

 

With his captor distracted for the moment, Gaara snuck towards the door and tried for the latch but it soon became obvious he was going to need to stand on something to reach the lock.

 

“You must be very intelligent to know how to unlock a door. I’m still not sure what you are though. You can’t speak, can you?”

 

‘If only.’ Gaara thought as he stared at her, caught red handed.

 

“Ah, there it is!” She pulled out a hair brush with very fine bristles. “Come here,” She said, patting the bed, but when the fluffy cannid made no move, she added “please.”

 

With an all too human sigh, he trudged forward to the bed and resigned himself to the further belittling of his dignity. This world had been humbling for the strongest shinobi in Suna, if nothing else.

 

He settled himself in her lap and wondered if it was entirely appropriate for a fourteen year old boy to be sat in bed with a thirteen year old girl past midnight. Then again, considering who they were and the undeniably exceptional circumstances, he didn’t think there was anything inappropriate going on other than her desire to brush his fur.

 

She talked endlessly as she brushed his fur and he thought about his latest DADA assignment. It was the height of boredom, barring the small level of intrigue seeing the brush work away at his tail. The thing was ninety percent hair and yet the brush only straightened the top layers.

 

She had hugged him like a stuffed animal after she had finished the brushing and had even scratched him behind the ear, which he DID NOT LIKE! Liar.

 

Luna eventually told him that she had always wanted a pet, but her father had said she had to discover a new animal if she wanted it. He honestly hadn’t expected her to… not until she had finished school at least. She had even taken a strip of blue cloth and tied it into a bow around his neck. At least it wasn’t a dog collar, he told himself.

 

She continued to babble about her dreams of pet ownership, and told him all about how he would have a comfy bed in her room and fresh lamb for dinner. She soon tired herself out and fell asleep.

 

As Gaara extracted himself from her clutches, he wondered whether he should re-evaluate his friendship with the girl since she was obviously insane. Although, he guessed it wasn’t as strange from her perspective since he was an animal and not her friend with an animal’s body.

 

Either way, he would look into buying her a stuffed animal whenever her birthday was, anything to keep her away from him during full moons in future.

 

He piled a couple of books up to reach the lock before excusing himself from the room. He still had a few hours before dawn, but after the harrowing night of captivity, he would be content to sit the classroom where his clothes were and continue reading his book.

 

When the sun indeed began to rise, Gaara assess his evening: it had been a trying and annoying night, but at least he had managed to escape without any damage or questions.

 

It was only when the sun had risen and he was back in his own body that Gaara remembered the blue bow still tied around his neck.

 

What he had not expected, as he tried to pull the thing off, was that Luna had had the foresight to spell the thing on her new animal friend so that it wasn’t pulled off accidentally. Gaara tugged and pulled at the material but for all of his immense strength the thing wouldn’t budge. Even his kunai couldn’t cut the thin material, which meant that nothing short of magic would relieve him of this latest… even the word humiliation didn’t capture the feeling.

 

He considered using his wand, but somehow pointing his wand at his own neck set off his honed survival instincts. The other option would be showing the bow to someone else like Draco…

 

So, it was going to being staying for a while.

 

He tied his Hitai-ate around his neck and got fully dressed. On his way to the Great Hall for breakfast, he destroyed a number of suits of armour and hastily evacuated paintings, and Draco noted that Gaara seemed to be in a particularly foul mood that morning, though he couldn’t guess why. Then again, it was anybody’s guess what Gaara did on the many nights he went missing but usually it seemed to alleviate stress.

 

Gaara noticed that Luna seemed to have been crying when she showed up in the Great Hall. Ginny went and comforted to the grief stricken girl which meant Gaara had no compulsion to be anywhere near his kidnapper.

 

That evening, as Gaara was getting ready for bed and coughing his larynx up, and Draco was finishing up his Potions homework, he thought, just for a moment, that he heard an almost inaudible “Ow” come from the other side of the room. He turned but it was only Gaara there, looking wide eyed as he sometimes tended to and miming words.

 

He must have been hearing things.

 

0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0 

 

Omake:

 

Draco was as cold as Gaara had imagined, floating out in the middle of the Winter wind, desperately looking for the Snitch. He did indeed take solace in the proactive Seeking he and Potter had been doing. Sitting still in this weather would have left his frozen to his broom by the end of the match. Though, as it was, moving at such high speed was making the wind-chill even worse.

 

As always, there was solace to be taken in Potter’s equal suffering.

 

Draco always looked for two people in the stands during matches, giving brief glances lest he missed the golden ball he was hunting for. He usually found his father first, since he sat with the Professors and Governors. The man would sometimes let a thin smile work its way onto his face, but not because he enjoyed the game. It was one of the rare instances that the Malfoy patriarch allowed himself to display any sort of pride in his son in public.

 

And then there was Gaara… who had apparently constructed a full blown house made out of his sand up in the stands. It looked so warm he resented his best friend immensely. He had to admit, he had spent more than the intended moment glancing at his friend, amazed that his weirdo roommate could still shock and surprise him, each and every time.

 

Jinchūriki had a flare for unpredictability, whether they were rappers, psychopaths, or blond knuckleheads.

 

But even with that in mind, Potter would have agreed that the occasional sounds of barking or stifled howling coming from Gaara’s shelter was beyond the pale.  


	10. A New Danger

“Ow.”

 

Wait, what?

 

Gaara’s throat had been hurting all morning, and just now he had tried to cough up some imaginary phlegm and a spike of pain had lanced through his throat and in that moment he had tried to exclaim his pain and his voice had made a sound.

 

It had lasted for a second, but he had most definitely said the word ‘ow’.

 

He ignored as Draco looked back at his quizzically, before shaking his head and going back to what he was doing. Gaara tried to say more words, anything, gritting his teeth metaphorically through the pain, but he couldn’t repeat the miraculous feat no matter what he tried to say.

 

It was disappointing, but he supposed it stood to reason if you shook a broken whistle long enough, it was bound to make a noise eventually. However short it might be.

 

He considered taking this unusual occurrence to their resident healer, but his previous experiences led Gaara to doubt that should he check himself in to the infirmary, he wouldn’t be able to check out again.

 

Madam Pomfrey had made such threats before and Gaara was in no doubt that she was the type of person to follow through on such promises. Plus, it was unsettling having to so closely skirt the truth of his demonic prisoner when his medical peculiarities came up.

 

He had a lot of secrets from the people in this world, but truthfully the ones he was most concerned about were the truths of who and what he was: murderer and host of a great demon.

 

Granted, it wasn’t likely that they would come out over a physical, but it was a good enough rationale to stay away from that crazy medic. Good enough for him, anyway.

 

He got a glass of water from the bathroom and wondered if he could manage sneaking into Madam Pomfrey’s medicine stores of Snape’s now carefully guarded potion’s closet. They were some of the most heavily warded places in the school, for good reason, but Gaara really could have done with getting some sort of pain relief; and his evasion of the Medical Wing aside, he knew better than take any potion give to him by his Head of House.

 

Seeing that he wouldn’t be getting any relief from the annoyance under his chin, Gaara went for a stroll. He had nine hours to kill before breakfast and he had finished his last book earlier in the day and the library was a favourite hangout for some of the ghosts this year. He had discovered that a few months back when he had snuck in to get a few books and borrow a few from the restricted section.

 

He had come perilously close to being found by the Bloody Baron as he had stuffed the fifth book in his bag, and the on his way out he had seen at least four other ghosts milling around the place. Later, Luna had told him that the ghosts’ old haunt had been beset by mice and they had been upset over the ‘unhygienic’ conditions. An affront to their dignity, Gaara supposed. Luna had said that they would be in the library until the House Elves had finished their pest control.

 

In the morning, after spending the night play cat and mouse with the professors on patrol, using his cloak to disguise himself, he was in very high spirits after his work out. Snape, McGonagall, Lupin and Filch did not look as well rested, even after they had retired before dawn for a couple hours of rest. Three of the four seemed to know who they had been chasing, but Lupin just looked grumpy and the others didn’t have any proof.

 

In fact, Lupin looked pretty haggard, but then Gaara had been surprised to see the man patrolling the night after he had taken the day off from illness. These infrequent absences were starting to give credence to Gaara’s theory that Lupin was really a secret alcoholic.

 

Speaking of unwell people, Gaara watched Luna stumble into the Great Hall looking as sleep deprived as the professors and sporting red ringed eyes. She had clearly been crying a fair amount. She hadn’t shown up to breakfast or dinner the day before, but clearly his animal-self’s disappearance had been a bit of a blow to her. Shame.

 

Any more pitying emotions were immediately quieted by the rustle of fabric between his ever-present Hitai-ate and the bow locked around his neck.

 

Luna had shown up to breakfast in a state before, for a number of tragic reasons, but Draco only shown the vaguest interest now that she was carrying a bundle of paper with her. She passed a few out to the Ravenclaws near her before moving around the Hall. The Ravens seemed to be familiar with whatever was on there as they all laughed amongst themselves and set the papers back on the tabletop, to be subsumed by the breakfast plates and spills.

 

When she eventually made it over to Slytherin, after visiting all of the other tables beforehand and handing out her flyers, Draco was very interested to see what the commotion had been about. The reactions from the other students had mostly either been mocking laughter or sympathetic glances. Which were the usual polarised reactions the greater population of Hogwarts had to Luna Lovegood.

 

She came straight to the friendliest face (a description that had never been levelled at Gaara before) at the table and handed Gaara a small stack of papers to distribute around since she didn’t feel comfortable approaching all of those Slytherins.

 

Lo and behold, on the first sheet he saw a rather accurate sketch of his tanuki form. It was a missing pet poster.

 

If he could speak now, he would have said a few words Temari would have frowned at.

 

The posters, all identical by some spell or other, had the prominent and embarrassing sketch of his “cute and cuddly” (a description by some nearby seventh-year girls) form in the centre and at the top was indeed the word ‘MISSING’. Underneath it listed a couple of his attributes, including the blue bow. So now, if anybody saw it, it wouldn’t simply be a humiliating fashion accessory but instead would directly link him to the ridiculous little fuzzball drawn on the dozens of poster handed out in the Great Hall and plastered to walls all over the castle.

 

The posters even listed a reward of ‘Four Galleons and Eleven Sickles’, presumably all of Luna’s remaining pocket money which stirred only the most desperate for funds in the student body. Draco made a crass comment about the Weasley boy that Gaara didn’t pay any mind to.

 

By and large, most people were convinced that this was just the latest imaginary creature Luna had concocted, but it certainly did spur on conversations around the tables. A lot of scary or troubling things had happened this year at their beloved school, so a hunt for a made-up pet of some description helped to lighten the mood considerably.

 

This was why, covertly, Dumbledore leaned over and asked Fillius to let Luna off without punishment for littering all over the school. The Head of Ravenclaw agreed since he had seen how upset the girl had been since this pet of hers disappeared, real or not, and he didn’t have the heart to tell her off just yet, though he might have to have a word about getting permission before doing these kinds of things.

 

Most everyone thought Luna was crazy and Gaara agreed, but at least he knew she hadn’t made up the animal in question. If only…

 

Over at the Gryffindor table, Ron was looking at the poster wondering if it was even worth looking into. The money would be tempting, funding his next foray to Honeydukes in full, but he also knew his sister’s loony friend and wasn’t entirely sure if there was any pet to find.

 

Speaking of his annoying little sister, she had been the larger source of his recent family woes. Her crazy childhood friend aside, she had stepped up her creepy obsession with his best friend so he had been playing interference all year. Then there were Ginny’s gaggle of other contemptible friends who didn’t hold the respectable measure of fear second years were supposed to feel towards their upperclassman.

 

Then there were the twins. Those two, who were usually just insufferable, had been planning something since before Christmas and it was starting to make their youngest brother worry. They’re birthday was only two months away and that always yielded unfavourable results for everyone around them.

 

What Ron had failed to appreciate was that his family issues and the ongoing drama that followed their group year to year had stopped him from flying off the handle at Hermione over the Crookshanks/Scabbers fight.

 

What might have led to a months long spat between the boy and girl had just become an uncomfortable subject when they had so many other distracting matters to attend to. And in that same vein, Harry had delved into his schoolwork, to Hermione’s delight, to avoid lingering on the less glamorous aspects of his life.

 

It was events like this poster, that was soon charmed to read ‘WANTED’ instead of missing, and called it (Gaara) the ‘Fluffy Bandit’ instead of a rare breed of tanuki, that helped to liven not just the student body’s mood, but the put-upon Golden Trio’s too.

 

It helped keep their minds off of the continuous threats of impending doom, etcetera…

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

The rematch between Gryffindor and Slytherin had delayed the official Quidditch season schedule by the better part of a month, so the match between Ravenclaw and Slytherin had only become more anticipated among the fans (students and a select group of dedicated alumni). That said, Sirius wasn’t bothered in slightest (actually going to the trouble of decrying it because of that troublesome broom) and Gaara didn’t see the reason he would have to attend this match.

 

Draco had thrown up before the match, something he hadn’t done since his first game in his second year. He was beyond nervous, as he naturally would be Gaara supposed considering the combination of his ‘failing’ in the previous one and Slytherin’s only remaining chance to win the cup riding on this match.

 

It didn’t make Draco feel any better that Gaara had oh-so-helpfully pointed this out to him, more for Gaara’s own clarification than to inform the stressed blond.

 

After Draco had stumbled into the Slytherin changing room, Gaara looked around for witnesses and considered walking away for the next hour. He could tell Draco he had been standing in the cheap seats with their Housemates the whole match…

 

Ah, hell, he’d just end up feeling guilty the whole time anyway, he might as well go and be bored there.

 

He soon regretted his sentimentality when the first gust of icy wind blew through him and he realised he could have been holed up in Gryffindor’s warm tower right now. Half of the House had turned out to cheer against Slytherin, so he probably wouldn’t have been noticed there for at least an hour.

 

But no, here he was watching a game he disliked in weather that made him positively yearn for the arid desert sun he’d seen people burn under.

 

At least Draco had somehow pushed through the nerves and was flying circles around Ravenclaw’s Seeker. He didn’t know if he could emotionally support his friend through another tragic loss like last time. He was nowhere close to stable enough to act as a crutch for someone else.

 

Thanks to his hesitation in coming to watch the match, the nice seats up in the stands had long since filled, so Gaara really did end up in the cheap seats among his fellow Slytherin supporters. And it was the strangest thing, the people surrounding him didn’t seem to have the same level fear they used to towards him.

 

He still had a clear bubble of clear space around him, but where once it was massive, not the clearance was about a foot. Any closer and his sand might have acted, but still it was a curious shift. He had received a terrifyingly dramatic prophecy, he had gotten into fights with Snape and Potter and had killed a number of dementors (but a fraction of the real number he had killed), he had caused the Sorting Hat to have a fit, a high level government Heihfhinspector had spent a day asking questions about him… and those were just the highlights of the things they _knew_ about.

 

Evidently, showing up to Quidditch matches, being friends with a second-year Ravenclaw girl (one that _used to be_ bullied frequently), spending all of one’s time openly studying, going to _the_ party of the year at the Malfoy’s and showcasing a shocking lack of guile or aggression, had continued the trend away from everybody fearing Gaara.

 

There was also the fact he had been an oddity, being a (weird) transfer student coming straight into the middle of his schooling, so that had been eased considerably by simply being seen about the school.

 

Gaara had been thinking about his surroundings, so once again he had missed the actual moment the Snitch was caught and the match was called. Slytherin had been ten points up before the disproportionate number were added from the Snitch, so with that score, Slytherin were back in the running for the school championship and Draco looked like he knew that fact already, as he flew down to present the Snitch to Madam Hooch.

 

Slytherin were cheering loudly, belying their usual subtle natures. They would have passed for Gryffindors, though Gaara didn’t think it prudent to say that aloud. He had amassed some goodwill in his house and he’d be damned if he was going to waste it on an innocent insult. That sort of improved relations was perfect for when he beat up someone or blew something up.

 

It was bound to happen.

 

Now, since they had beaten Ravenclaw, Slytherin would be facing Gryffindor in the finals. They had one more match before then but since it was against Hufflepuff, and the Badgers would have to beat Slytherin by over two hundred points, they were assured of reaching the finals. And unless Ravenclaw beat Gryffindor, the Lions would be there too. Draco said he fully expected there to be a ruling on their Firebolts by next year. They were giving them a disproportionate advantage.

 

Gaara didn’t see the problem with that. In his world, the people with the better weapons would naturally win, unless someone else’s skills made up the gap. He had never fully understood the concept of sportsmanship or fair play.

 

In for a penny, in for a pound. Gaara was already freezing cold, so he supposed he might as well wait for Draco to finish changing and walk in with him. Plus, he could enjoy his friend’s feelings of triumph for a change. Bask in the glow of a Quidditch Hero, as Draco had described his performance in the previous year.

 

“Gaara! Did you watch?” Draco’s mood had taken a U-turn.

 

Gaara nodded.

 

“Where were you, I looked in the stands?”

 

The sand trickled out as Gaara turned towards the castle. He wanted to be warm again. ‘They were full. I stood with our House.’

 

“Oh, right.” Draco was trying to remember where he had seen the gap in the spectators, but there hadn’t been one. So either Gaara was lying and he’d been hiding somewhere near a fireplace, or the other students had gotten over their fear of his roommate.

 

“Were you really there?”

 

Gaara sighed, ‘Yes, I was there. I stood next to miss Bulstrode. She cheers very loudly.’

 

Draco couldn’t argue that, but… “Wait, when you say ‘next to’, do you mean, like, right next to?”

 

‘Yes.’

 

Draco was surprised, so surprised he almost forgot what he had just been doing and how excited he was supposed to be. That lasted until they crossed paths with the first classmate on their way to the dungeons. Then Draco was back to good cheer, amplified by Gaara’s good (?) news.

 

When Gaara entered the Common Room with his friend, he considered whether he was better off with his mopey blond friend rather than this. He turned straight back around when he saw the raucous party already raging in there and headed to the Library. He could just about deal with the highs and lows of his friend’s emotions but he was still a long way away from (real) parties and large celebrations. 

 

The party had lasted into the night, being broken up by an irate Snape who didn’t appreciate having to tell off his own House for such a lowly complaint. Gaara showed up shortly after his Head of House had left and went to bed.

 

And then he threw a book in Draco’s general direction when the celebrated Seeker had failed to take the hint and be quiet. It was difficult enough being an insomniac with a roommate, he didn’t need anything else keeping him up. The constant screaming in his mind was plenty.

 

The next weekend was a Hogsmeade weekend but Gaara had decided he would take the day to relax for once.

 

He wasn’t going to play with Fluffy, he wasn’t going to see Sirius or Remus, he wasn’t going to sneak out to hang out with Draco, and he certainly wasn’t going to the Library or visit Luna. Today, he was going to stay in and do nothing.

 

Well, he couldn’t do _nothing_ … that would be worse than doing something. But he was going to relax while doing it. He had saved up a few books lately that promised to be interesting reads, and he didn’t plan on leaving the Slytherin chambers. He might get a little peckish towards the evening, but even if Draco wouldn’t sneak him some food, he would be fine without.

 

His first non-task of the day was sharpening his precious weapons. He had searched high and low but had finally managed to procure a whet stone with which to restore his remaining two kunai, three shuriken and the senbon he had borrowed from Kankuro.

 

As soon as Draco had left, Gaara had started soaking the stone in their basin and setting up a waterproof station on his desk. He had never been nearly as good as his brother at maintaining his weapons, he had never even been much of a weapons user since he had his sand, but he could get his kunai up to standard if he spent a while at it.

 

That was how he spent the first two and a half hours of his Saturday morning and it was as close to meditation as he could get without dipping into his mindscape and having to confront Shukaku. He had avoided his tenant for a couple of months now and he wasn’t in any hurry to visit.

 

Inevitably, since Gaara had planned to enjoy a day of rest, he quickly grew bored with his slow schedule and ended up trying and failing to pull off the bow from around his neck. After his neck was red and sore, he gave up again and moved onto the next task.

 

By the time Draco returned in the late afternoon, he found Gaara quite irritable. Obviously Gaara was too driven to enjoy a ‘day off’, but Draco hadn’t wanted to stand in the way of his intense roommate’s attempt at slacking off, even for a single day. If Gaara could embrace the dilatants’ lifestyle, he would never ask Draco to do one of those Merlin-forsaken marathons or obstacle courses ever again.

 

The next day, Gaara knew better than stay in, especially since Draco would be there this time, so he went to visit his current favourite dog in the forest. It had been a while since he went specifically to see Fluffy so he figured it was about time. Plus he wanted to put a little distance between Draco and him after there had been a close call that morning when they were getting changed.

 

The simple and routine action of changing clothes had become trickier now that he had that damnable piece of cloth tied to him.

 

In any case, having Draco anywhere near the thing put him on edge, so he was going to soothe his nerves in the only way he knew how, by wasting an afternoon on a dumb, slobbering creature (and not Sirius). It didn’t occur to the book-smart red-head that he had stressed himself out the day before trying to relax by doing nothing when he could have done one of the many pastimes he had in this world to unwind.

 

Over thinking was the least of his problems.

 

He continued his slow attempts at training the great beast interspersed with liberal amounts of playtime in between. And then who should show up but Padfoot, looking particularly pleased with himself for finding not only Fluffy but his favourite (living) scary-eyed redhead.

 

“Lily!” He he changed back into human form immediately, “What are you doing here with the Cerberus?”

 

Gaara looked back at the three-headed dog, ‘I’ve known Fluffy for quite some time.’

 

“Well, why didn’t you say so?” He cracked under Gaara’s unyielding gaze, and then though “Wait, did you say Fluffy? Did you name him Fluffy?” Sirius looked like he was going to crack up any second.

 

‘No. He was Hagrid’s pet.’

 

Fluffy took that moment to nuzzle Gaara’s entire back with one of its noses, pushing the easily irked boy forwards a step or two.

 

‘He’s mine now.’ Gaara wrote out. Fluffy might as well be his since Hagrid hardly visited the dog anymore.

 

“He’s yours?” Sirius couldn’t believe it as he looked from the diminutive boy to the house-sized dog.

 

Gaara stared for a second more, then click his fingers and pointed in front of his, and Fluffy jumped straight to attention and ran from behind Gaara to stand in front of him. Gaara then held his palm up and Fluffy sat, and then he pointed down and Fluffy laid down.

 

Sirius was gobsmacked. This was… strange, even for Gaara.

 

“Well, I have to admit, I’m impressed, Lily.”

 

Gaara turned his hundred-watt glare onto full beam when he heard the demeaning moniker. People weren’t afraid of him anymore, he had this stupid bow around his neck, Luna was trying to capture him for a pet, and he didn’t need another reminder of his diminishing menace. His dignity was under constant threat.

 

Wilting further under the evil eyes, Sirius fell back into his dog form. He told himself it wasn’t out of fear from a fifteen year-old, it was because a dementor might sense him and bring a full flock of them.

 

Watching the man turn into a dog properly this time, Fluffy barked excitedly from his position on the forest floor, but didn’t stand back up until he got a nod from Gaara. After which, Gaara had to remind himself he wasn’t watching two normal dogs romping around in the woods, he was watching an escaped convict in a dog’s body playing around with a giant three-headed hellhound.

 

He dealt with an inordinate amount of strange things in his day to day life, but he liked to state it plainly every now and then for the sake of his strained sanity.

 

Sighed, he gave up and three sticks for the dogs to chase after. Sirius might have been smarter (though it was a closer call than it should have been), Fluffy had the obvious advantage in size and speed.

 

When he grew tired of it, he walked away without a nod to the animals, knowing Fluffy understood him by now and not caring what Padfoot would think. When he got back to the castle, he thoroughly washed his hands and went to see Draco.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

The castles were always quiet during the evenings, the school’s temporary rules calling for students not to wander the corridors after classes in groups less than four unless under third year, in which case they had to be escorted by a professor. The latest measure against attack from the dastardly Mr Black and scarily reminiscent of the threat they had lived under last year.

 

Naturally, such rules didn’t apply to Gaara, so he walked through the empty hallways with impunity until he reached his Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom. Sadly, that was where he bumped into Potter, quite literally.

 

Harry had been walking from the other direction, having snuck away from the Gryffindor common since he didn’t want to cause a fuss, having multiple people escort him there and then go back to the tower. He had been thinking about all of the powerful magical things he would do if Sirius jumped out of each darkened corner he passed, when he had walked into an unexpected stone wall.

 

When he looked up from the floor, the stone wall he had walked into quickly broke up and sifted back into Gaara’s gourd and his current nemesis didn’t seem at all sorry. He had the gall to pretend to be surprised when he saw Harry on the floor, as if he hadn’t made it happen.

 

“What was that for?!”

 

Gaara looked at Harry and put the pieces together, ‘My apologies. It’s automatic.’

 

“What? Don’t lie, you just knocked me on my back!”

 

‘It’s involuntary. An automatic protection.’

 

Immediately Harry wished he had something near him to throw at the Slytherin’s head to see if he was telling the truth.

 

“What’s going on out here?” Lupin asked, peering out from the door at Harry picking himself up off the ground and Gaara sporting the clueless look he wore whenever he wasn’t glaring.

 

“Nothing.” Harry ground out, hiding none of the resentment he felt towards Gaara as he walked into the classroom.

 

Gaara looked at the retreating figure and then at the professor and shrugged and walked in as well.

 

The tutorial went about as well as they usually did, with Lupin focussing closely on Harry’s Patronus since it was such an advanced technique and required careful supervision now that he was practicing on a Boggart. Every now and then, he would give Harry a short break and check up on Gaara who was working on much simpler spells.

 

It wasn’t a matter of favouritism, as Lupin had stressed on multiple occasions to Gaara, but one of necessity. Since Gaara wasn’t likely to get hurt or hurt himself, at least not with the exact spells Lupin had set him on.

 

It was amazing that Gaara had still managed to cast a bouncing ball of bright something or other at a wall and have it come right back at him, from the innocuous illusion charm he had been trying to cast. True to function, his sand had jump up to block the incoming spell and after a bright flash, a tennis ball sized chunk of glass fell to the floor.

 

“How can he be so bad at that?” Harry not-quite-whispered at Lupin.

 

Gaara turned to scowl at the rude teenager. Sure, they didn’t like each other and had at one time come to blows, but there was no call to be so discourteous.

 

Lupin frowned, understanding that Harry was bating Gaara. “That’s enough Harry. Just concentrate on your own work and leave Gaara to his.”

 

“I know, but should he be embarrassed? I’ve seen first years with more-”

 

“Harry, I said that’s enough.” Lupin was not about to let a fight break out under his watch.

 

“It’s not my fault he’s dumb as well as mute.”

 

Oh, that was _it._ Gaara had killed for so much less. He shoved his unnecessary wand back into his pocket and turned to his quarry.

 

Lupin watched this happen and stood directly between them. “Harry, I’m going to have to take five points from Gryffindor for your rudeness, and another for ignoring my instruction.” He then turned to address Gaara, “And if I see a single grain of sand within a metre of Harry, Gaara, I will refuse to teach you any more outside of lessons.”

 

Gaara figured it was a bluff, but if he wanted to knock Harry about he would hit Remus first. It suddenly didn’t seem worth it.

 

Lupin started, “You’re both fourteen-”

 

“I’m thirteen, sir.”

 

“Yes, fine, okay, you’re both young men now, you aren’t children. You need to start acting a little more responsibly. Harry, you shouldn’t let your emotions get the better of you and you certainly shouldn’t be starting fights.” Lupin didn’t mention that he thought Harry shouldn’t be starting fights with people who might kill him.

 

“And Gaara, _you_ shouldn’t be rising to every challenge that you’re presented with. You need to find some other way to release your pent up anger.” Remus was feeling very chuffed with himself for rising to this teachable moment, until…

 

‘Responsible adults drink while they’re meant to be looking after children?’ Gaara wasn’t entirely sure what the rules were.

 

Before Harry could peer around the professor and see what the freak had written with his sand, Lupin jumped forward and brushed it out of shape.

 

“That was a separate issue. We need to be getting back to work before dinner.” He said quickly, ushering Gaara back to his corner of the room and motioning for Harry to do the same.

 

When Gaara was back to working on his upper second year spells, Lupin returned to Harry and tried explaining some of the more advanced magical theories behind the Patronus’ effects on dementors.

 

“Sir, Gaara mentioned that his sand protects him automatically. Do you know what spell he uses to control it?” This time, Harry had the good sense to keep his whispers between just them this time.

 

“Well, I don’t like to discuss other people’s affairs behind their backs, but since this is clearly a matter of contention for you two, I might as well. But, I’m afraid the answer is that I do not know what magic Gaara uses specifically, or even if it is an exact spell or if it’s some form of wordless, wandless magic.”

 

“Isn’t that really advanced, sir?”

 

“Yes, it is. Which points to it being something else entirely, since Gaara has his difficulties with magic. There is also the possibility that his sand itself is a charmed or enchanted object, which is still unlikely but not impossible. The fact is that no matter what it is, it is going to be something rather unlikely.”

 

Harry digested this. He had assumed the teachers were all in on the secret of Gaara, but it seemed he was just as much a mystery to them as him.

 

“But what about the automatic thing, sir?”

 

“Well, obviously the sand cannot be fully sentient, but objects can be enchanted to react to threats or certain actions. For instance,” He got a mischievous gleam in his wrinkled eyes. He pulled out his wand and levelled it at the back of Gaara’s head. He shot out a burst of red sparks towards his friend and trusting pupil, but before it could impact on his head with the force of a gentle slap upside the head, a thin tendril of sand flew up and intercepted it.

 

Gaara looked around as if someone had said his name, saw the sand and turned to the other occupants of the office. Lupin and Harry were looking the other way, and Harry didn’t have his wand, so he assumed his sand had sense a fly or something else. He shook his head and called the sand back into his gourd, going back to his work.

 

Lupin smirked and was happy when Harry did the same, reminding him so vividly of similar exploits he and James had gotten into. “And thus we can conclude a certain level of autonomy in Gaara’s sand.”

 

“Sir, you knew my mother and my father.”

 

“Yes, I did.” Lupin was wondering where this would lead since they had discussed that topic at length before.

 

“It’s just, I know you haven’t invited everyone to have extra tutorials with you, and I was thinking the reason you were willing to do it for me was that you knew my parents. But I was also wondering why you were tutoring Gaara as well.”

 

“Well, I suppose it is true that I took an extra interest in your education since I knew James and Lily so well, but that isn’t the reason I am helping you here. You are a phenomenally gifted young wizard and I want to make sure you are still being challenged. More harm than you know has been done by witches and wizards who have grown bored and tried to push their own limits. Not to mention your peculiar problem with the dementors which did require a solution.

 

“Now, as to Gaara, that was in a way the opposite. He has struggled with magic since he arrived at Hogwarts and was already at a disadvantage because he was put straight into the third year. I didn’t want him to be left behind.”

 

“Oh,” Harry said, “I guess that makes sense.”

 

“It’s not only that, though, Harry. Gaara is odd, there’s no denying that fact.” Lupin continued after Harry snorted in agreement, “He is a stranger in the school and in this country and I thought it would help him to not feel so alienated if he had a friend amongst the teaching staff to help him.”

 

Harry didn’t bother asking why Gaara’s Head of House hadn’t filled that role since he wouldn’t have counted on Snape to do it even if he didn’t have that weird vendetta against Gaara. Still, it was a strange feeling to come to understand Gaara a little bit.

 

“Where exactly does Gaara come from, sir? No one seems to know and none of the professors will answer.”

 

Lupin thought quickly, “That’s not for me to say, if Gaara would prefer people not know. I’ve said more than I should already, but I want you to try to understand Gaara a bit more. I know the way people think about Slytherins, and I know the way they act, but they aren’t all evil, and Gaara most certainly isn’t.”

 

“If you say so, sir.” Harry said, deferentially. There was no way he could think of Slytherin as anything but the proverbial den of snakes that it was, but he would try to keep more of an open mind about the raccoon-impersonator at the other side of the room. Although, he couldn’t promise that it would add up to any more than not openly antagonising him, but he would make that effort.

 

Malfoy was still fair game, though.

 

All this while, Gaara had been trying to ignore the whispering going on with Lupin and Potter. He could just about make out the odd word, but nothing meaningful, although he had to restrain his violent reflexes when he heard the name ‘Lily’ in amongst the hushed chatter. The only thing stopping him doing bad things was the memory that Potter’s mother, Lupin’s friend, had been the origin of that moniker.

 

Still, the evening’s tension had ruined Gaara’s mood so when dinnertime came, he left shortly after Potter did and headed straight to the Great Hall to eat something, unknowingly doing a kindness to Lupin who wanted to do the same.

 

He didn’t notice that Harry and his friends seemed unusually interested in him that night, discussing what Lupin had said frenziedly. Regardless of any animosity between them, the Golden Trio loved a good mystery and Gaara was the closest at hand.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Classes were proceeding quite smoothly for Gaara by this point. The teachers had all learned not to call on Gaara for practical demonstrations, but he could always be trusted to give a good academic answer. They also knew Gaara concentrated better when he was sat next to Draco (the only friendly face), and that the less they bothered him, the happier everyone was.

 

Flitwick found himself envying Snape briefly, since his colleague had gotten his hands on yet another genius student. Then he thought about the correlational trouble that followed the boy and thought maybe he was better off without him in his House. McGonagall had agreed with that sentiment heartily, especially considering how Snape had taken to the boy.

 

Sprout had nothing but good things to say about the quiet, somewhat jumpy boy. He was very wary of her plants, even the harmless ones, but he had never caused any trouble (that she knew about) and he had always respected her, unlike a large proportion of his housemates.

 

The teachers had their own cliques that they socialised in, so Trelawney didn’t know all that much about Gaara outside of her own lessons, but she had met up with Albus and Minerva a few times, and Gaara had been the hot topic more than once. The only person they talked about more was Potter, which made sense considering both the situation with Sirius Black, and because of Sybill’s unique connection to Harry’s history.

 

And then there was Snape, who no one had spoken a word about Gaara to since their big blow out.

 

One topic that had been repeatedly raised regarding the transfer had been his extra curricular interests. He had sporadic, almost random interests in esoteric magical subjects and disciplines that changed week by week. Albus had noticed these occasional mentionings but had dismissed them as part of Gaara’s bookish nature. None of the texts were harmful or particularly dark, even if a few of them had been swiped from the Restricted Section.

 

With Gaara, that was par for the course.

 

He would keep an eye on the boy’s reading, but he wouldn’t involve himself unless he felt it necessary. He might, if the occasion presented itself bring it up with the person in question, but the mysterious child had been laying low recently, so he hadn’t ‘spoken’ with him in a while.

 

It wasn’t disinterest or a lack of concern, but Albus had bigger problems to deal with, even within the student body. Yet another pregnancy in the seventh year, a bare knuckle fight between fourth years, and the ever-present issue of Harry…

 

That poor, overburdened child. At least he was dominating in this year’s Quidditch. Benign Headmaster that he was, he wasn’t above cheering for his old House above the others.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

The month had gone far too quickly in Gaara’s mind. He had been under the impression that this sort of lapse in perception of the passing of the days, weeks and months, didn’t start happening until one became a bored adult. He dreaded the thought that he was already having a midlife crisis.

 

So, he was in agreement with himself, the month should not have finished already, but here he was at the end of February already and another lunar headache looming. He was still suffering the repercussions of last month around his neck and was in no hurry to see how this month could make his life worse.

 

Terrified of getting captured (by Luna) again, he made the decision to change in the forest again, seemingly changing his mind every other month about where was safest to be. Still, threat of death was preferable to another ribbon or something.

 

As he stood out in the cold, the Winter still running strong, Gaara continued to lament the terrible choices available to him.

 

He had brought a burlap sack to store his clothes in for the night and hung it on a branch to keep it away from the damp and frost. He was getting entirely too used to all of this, but with a sigh he felt the shift fall over him and suddenly he was a tanuki-demon-human. At least he was less prone to ruminating when he was in this form. He was too instinctual to be thinking about his shitty situation when he was like this.

 

Like he did every time he was free to do so, he spent his night running around frantically like a ‘wild animal.’ He explored some of the areas of the forest he’d never bothered visiting before, mostly because he was bored and wanted to avoid Fluffy more than anything else.

 

He avoided any liquid puddles or lakes for fear of catching his reflection and being confronted with the inescapable blue bow tied around his neck. A questionable and perhaps effeminate fashion accessory on a human, on a small, furry animal, it was undoubtedly the mark of a pet.

 

It was after an hour or two that Gaara realised in his foggy brain that his surroundings were starting to look… off. The woods looked old, or unkempt, or dirty? There was something strange about this area of the woods, but it wasn’t until he was deep into it that he realised what he had been seeing more and more of were webs all over the branches and roots.

 

He’d wandered into the acromantulas’ territory, which was usually good for a laugh when he had sand and the ability to slaughter a couple dozen of them. Between the acromantulas and the dementors, Gaara’s murderous instincts had plenty of creative outlets.

 

Now, however, in this most vulnerable of states, Gaara wasn’t so pleased to see the warning signs of the giant spider nest so close by. He swiftly turned tail and began to sprint back the way he came, all four of his legs working hard to get him away before his morsel-like form was happened-upon by a lucky spider.

 

He didn’t hear nor see the spider approach until he felt the sharp legs pressing in on his tiny shoulder when he had paused in a clearing to gather his bearings. The pressure made him flinch and spin around on all fours, but by then the spider was all around him and spinning a web on his back.

 

Gaara thrashed around and tried to manoeuvre his tail into position to beat the arachnid off of him but despite being as tall as his human form, it was quick and versatile and stayed out of the way. And then he felt his tail get stuck to his back, and he knew if he didn’t stop the spider soon, he would be cocooned in two minutes.

 

The spider was turning him then, trying to cover him totally and evenly for what was to come afterwards. Gaara tried to extend his legs and break the web with force but it was too strong for his meagre strength. He extended his tiny claws to cut through the sack covering him, but they weren’t long enough to break through and any damage he made was covered by another two layers in seconds.

 

His last resort was instinctual, totally out of Gaara’s conscious control. He called out for help.

 

It was a whining howl that Gaara had heard once or twice in his childhood when an animal could no longer fight or run away. A human might have accepted their fate, but the animals always called out, and now Gaara’s weird animalistic brain had forced him to do the same.

 

He hadn’t planned to do it, and after he had made the pathetic noise, he hadn’t expected anything to come of it, except for the spider to pause in its preparations to make sure he wasn’t escaping.

 

Gaara certainly hadn’t expected to hear, as he strained against his cocoon with all of his diminished might, the sound of four feet hitting the ground in sequence nearby. He hadn’t expected the startled cry the spider on top of him gave as that approaching quadruped neared. Least of all, he hadn’t expected to feel the nightmarish creature being tackle off of him by the interloper.

 

Imprisoned as he was, Gaara could only listen to the sounds of the fight going on right by his defenceless body. Whoever had saved him deserved a lot of gratitude since death by spider would not have been pretty and would not have been quick, if his text books had been reliable.

 

The spider made a sound Gaara wasn’t familiar with, but it didn’t make any more afterwards so he thought he would be safe for the time being.

 

Whatever had come to his rescue, it wasn’t a centaur since they didn’t like Gaara and stayed away from him, plus they were more likely to talk to him after the threat was disposed of, instead of nudging him with their nose. For a moment he wondered if it was one of the canines he knew, but the warbling, low howl sounded nothing like Padfoot’s bark or Fluffy’s booming woofs.

 

The wet nose against his side opened to teeth and started to gnaw at the webs binding him. They were careful and didn’t do more than nip at the webs until his arm was free to reach up and tear away the covering from his head. As soon as his face was free, Gaara reconsidered whether he was better off with the spider.

 

There, in front of him, stood a full-grown, transformed werewolf. And it looked very interested in Gaara.

 

He did _not_ let out a whine.

 

He stared, motionless, up at the gigantic wolf, wondering when the new attack would commence. The spider had been quick, and its movements had been unpredictable, but the animal above him would be much simpler to counter. Though, he still didn’t much like his chances considering the size difference, all it would take was for the werewolf to lunge at Gaara’s unprotected throat and there was little he could do about it with his arms still caught in the remains of the webbing. It would take precious seconds he couldn’t afford to untangle himself.

 

He watched the wolf sniff at him and then nudge him with its snout. It took a good long look at the bow around his neck, but didn’t pay it much mind after finding it wouldn’t come off with a toothy pull. Eventually, the beast sat back on its haunches and watched Gaara, as if expecting something. When Gaara still made no move, wondering if playing dead would actually work for once.

 

He’d come across a few genin in his own world, a couple of years ago, that had thought staying still would hide them from him. It didn’t.

 

The wolf grew impatient as quickly as one would expect of a wild animal and started to shift and fidget, throwing a few irritable barks his way. When it looked like the wolf would move back towards him, Gaara ever so slowly climbed out of the ripped cocoon.

 

He immediately dropped down onto four paws when the wolf gave him a look bordering on aggression, but now he was up, he still didn’t want to move.

 

Last month had been humiliation, this month was unsettling. Gaara had always been the predator in his life. He had killed so many, and yet here he was, nothing more than prey, struggling to move before a bigger threat.

 

Was dignity some foreign presence in this world?!

 

He couldn’t work himself into any sort of state since the wolf had started forward again towards him, slowly this time, and he didn’t want to introduce any agitation to the already fraught situation.

 

As best he could, Gaara tried to act casual, moving slowly but not fearfully. The wolf continued to examine him, clearly trying to figure out what Gaara was, or perhaps if he was edible. Eventually, when Gaara tail had ‘casually’ swayed into a position where he could swing it full-force into the wolf’s side to get enough of a lead to run away, the wolf gave one of his large, blue-tipped ears a lick, woofed, and then started to jump about.

 

Gaara had seen this exact behaviour very recently, though watching a playful canine hop around was less amusing when it was an adult werewolf with perpetually dripping fangs and a number of scars crisscrossing its body.

 

Gaara had two options at this juncture: he could swing his tail and make a run for it, hiding from the wolf until dawn; or he could play along, quite literally, and try not to upset the big bad wolf.

 

He sighed, a gesture that was still strange in this inhuman body.

 

He darted away from the wolf and then circled back around, initiating the game of tag.

 

Gaara had heard about werewolves, about how they were vicious to everyone and everything that wasn’t one of their own, about how they transformed, and how they could transfer their plague with a bite or a scratch when in their animal form. Gaara had NOT heard about how werewolves likes to play inexhaustibly all through the night.

 

More than once, they had played tug-of-war with a stick or root one of them picked up. Gaara would be brushing his teeth as soon as he got to his room.

 

By the time the sun ought to be arriving soon, Gaara was worn out, a feeling he had not come to associate with his tanuki-hybrid body. Seeing as they were both human when the sun was shining, Gaara was hoping the adult creature would let him leave before they both reverted since he didn’t feel like being exposed (in both senses) to some stranger. The probable Hogsmeade citizen would likely feel the same if he had retained his faculties like Gaara did.

 

The Wolfsbane potion did wonders for the disposition of werewolves, Draco had explained in lieu of Snape for obvious reasons, but it was still the animal in control. At the beginning of the night, Gaara had thought the being was unmedicated and thus likely to attack, but it turned out that it had been dosed and was instead jovial.

 

The werewolf took a sniff at the lightening skies and went bounding off into the woods without a look back at his companion for the night.

 

Gaara would pretend it never happened, and the wolf wouldn’t remember enough to contradict him anyway.

 

He went running towards he left his clothes the night before, desperate not to change before they were in his arms. As he made his way, Gaara considered how his last few moons had been pretty awful: he’d been chased around the castle, he’d had a quiet one, then Luna had kidnapped him, and tonight he had been attacked by an acromantula and a werewolf.

 

That was how he would tell the story, if ever there came opportunity to tell it, that he had bravely fought off the giant spider and the wolf, and escaped with his pelt and his dignity in one piece.

 

Speaking of the little Ravenclaw girl who was one small step out of sync with the rest of the wizarding world, she had been up the entire night frantically searching the entire castle from top to bottom, including the surrounding grounds for her lost fluffy pet. Well, that had been the plan. She had been interrupted before she could make it outside, caught in the middle of a yawn by McGonagall who always stayed up an extra hour on full-moons because of the students’ tendency to make mischief.

 

Bloody lunatics.

 

She had dragged Luna back to the Ravenclaw dormitory and had woken Flitwick in his adjoining quarters to dish out the necessary reprimand. Luna had received a week’s detention for breaking curfew, but all she cared about was not finding her cute pet tanuki.

 

And the adults hadn’t cared at all, thinking her latest hunt was just another eccentricity. It was so frustrating always being right and never being believed, sometimes.

 

Draco, on the other hand, had had another sound night’s sleep.

 

Originally, Gaara had been knocking Draco out every full moon in various ways to avoid the questions about his disappearance during the night. But since Gaara rarely went more than four days without spending a night outside of their dormitory, he had realised assaulting his friend on those specific nights would leave more of a trail than just pretending he spent the night elsewhere again.

 

A part of him would miss inflicting that minor violence against his pompous roommate, though.

 

Again, Gaara’s throat was killing him after his body had reverted to the much more comfortable and deadly format, but he chalked it up to the cold nights and his warm temperament. He suspected he was suffering from his first cold, according the symptoms he had been told about.

 

His one and only friend back home had managed to catch one before visiting Suna that one time, and everyone had mocked him for catching a cold in summer. Gaara thought it was strange to mock the afflicted, especially since his reform, but he also wondered how a Jinchūriki with an even stronger life force than his own could have caught a virus.

 

Still, it didn’t bode well for Gaara since being ‘ill’ appeared to be an intensely unpleasant experience.

 

In the Great Hall that morning, Gaara drank a great deal of milk to soothe his sore throat, and wondered how one fought off a cold. Perhaps the wizards had done something useful for once and cured the common cold. Draco said they had not.

 

Luna moped into her cereal, fighting back tears and fighting off the drowsiness that threatened to drown her in her Cheerios.

 

Lupin was forced to show up to breakfast despite his recovery only just beginning. Dumbledore had suggested he do this every few months to stop people recognising the pattern of absences. He was in a terrible state despite the Wolfsbane potion he had taken, with both the physical strain and the mental unease, remembering flickers of the night before.

 

Usually this entailed a few grizzly highlights including eating a couple of rabbits, or fighting acromantulas or being run off by the centaurs. This morning, however, he remembered one interesting thing. After the obligatory running and fighting, he recalled seeing a small fluffy-tailed creature and had played with it all through the night, much like he had when he was younger, with Padfoot and Prongs.

 

He realised with a start, jarring a headache into full swing from the sudden motion, that the young animal had bourn a striking resemblance to the unusual animal that the odd Ravenclaw girl had reported missing towards the end of January. Now that he thought about it, he was pretty sure the bizarre little thing had been wearing the bow around its neck that the posters had specified.

 

Lupin sighed and wondered how he could persuade Poppy to give him something intoxicating to get through the day’s classes. He knew he wasn’t the first teacher to ask, probably not even the first to ask that day when Trelawney had been spotted outside of her tower, but it would be worth a try.

 

Thoughts of mind numbing potions effectively distracted him from the oddity he had encountered the night before.

 

Draco, still yawning the last of his good night’s sleep from his system, looked over at Gaara who appeared to be as agitated as he most often was after his nights away from his bed. He was wondering what his humanoid typhoon of a roommate was playing with under the table, and then he saw that strange dark knife he carried flash in the morning light.

 

“Gaara, stop whittling your wand!” He whispered incredulously.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

It was in the first week of March that Gaara read the Daily Prophet for the first time, after Draco mentioned an interesting (important) article of the front page. Gaara had never cared to read the paper, both because it pertained to events he felt had no relevance to him, and because even Draco (after talking with the uninitiated moderates) admitted it was biased and badly written.

 

Just from reading the front page, Gaara agreed with at least that last point.

 

The reason he had snatched the paper away from his friend, and ignored the angry shouting afterwards, was because Draco had read this headline aloud: ‘Black to be Kissed, Orders Fudge.’

 

It didn’t occur to Gaara that the dementors would be involved in this, his mind was caught up in the scandalous orders given by the head of magical Britain. His imagination conjured up the vision of Sirius being pursued by a dozen desperate middle-aged women trying to kiss him.

 

It was a disturbing thought.

 

Then he read the rest of the article as was immensely glad he hadn’t broadcasted his immature musing to anyone close by. The truth of the matter made him feel sick, understanding how damaging the loss of a soul could be someone. In theory.

 

The article told of how the investigation had failed to apprehend the fugitive and that the administration was redoubling their efforts, highlighting the increased ‘patrols’ (because they didn’t want to bring anyone’s attention to the dementors). It stated that when asked, Minster Fudge had revealed that the order was no to ‘Kiss on Sight.’

 

It was sickening, not just the terrible fate Sirius would now suffer should he be caught, but also the smiles and laughs around the Hall from people also reading the Prophet. Maybe it was because he had never been involved in the criminal justice system in his home village, or because the individual villages had their own centralised systems so they were simpler; in any case, the injustice being perpetrated against Sirius was entirely foreign to Gaara, and very upsetting.

 

Granted, shinobi could be framed and taken in as traitors, but they were always thoroughly interrogated. They almost always found out if a person was innocent or guilty once they were in T&I cells of any village. As Sirius told it, he hadn’t even had a trial (the convoluted Earth version of interrogation, as far as Gaara understood.)

 

Suddenly cross with the student body, Gaara was happy to follow Draco back to the dormitory where he was less likely to do something malevolent. That thought lasted until Draco stopped in front of the one room in the Dungeons that Gaara had stepped foot in for months.

 

Technically he had burgled the closet opposite the Potion’s classroom not too long ago, but he hadn’t stepped foot in Snape’s actual classroom since their ‘spat.’

 

Gaara couldn’t blame Draco for his double-take when he turned around and saw him. Gaara walked quietly, as anyone in his profession would, so it was perfectly understandable that he had been overlooked.

 

“Oh, um Gaara, I didn’t see you. You should, um, go ahead to the dorms. I’ll see you in bit.” Draco was rightfully nervous; Snape had the hearing of some kind of sonar-capable animal, and there was no telling what he would overhear through a door or when he pop out.

 

The door creaked open.

 

Snape poked his head out of the door, expecting half of what he saw, a student needing advice on an assignment, content to interrupt his precious and rare free time (spent working) without any due regard. He had not expected to see Gaara, of all people, stood next to the student (that he would have helped anyway, after the griping.)

 

Snape had been in a comparatively goof mood until that moment.

 

“Don’t tell me _you_ want to come back to my class.” He said, his eyebrow quirking along with his lip.

 

Gaara didn’t answer, he just continued to stare.

 

“Because, while the headmaster may have strong-armed into letting you join my class, I have a much higher standard for admittance, and you certainly do not measure up. I don’t care what that- what Lupin has been filling your head with, you’re still useless. I won’t permit _dangerous entities_ into my Potions laboratory.”

 

Rather than rising to the continued barbs or making a cutting retort, Gaara wrote out, ‘Why do you hate me so much?’

 

Snape took a moment to look at the question, something passing over his face before twitching back to his contemptible default. “You are a killer, boy. I don’t care what lies you have been plying Dumbledore with, we both know you have killed people.”

 

Draco was wide eyed, hearing some of his worst suspicions mentioned bitingly, aloud, and not seeing any kind of denial or anger on Gaara’s face.

 

“I know that look, those eyes. It’s disgusting, seeing that look on those eyes. Any magic you learn would only be an effort to bolster your fighting power, and I will not be a party to that. Worst of all, I hate reminders, and you are a product of some sort of war. I don’t care which one, or where, but you were used as a weapon and you do not belong in this school.”

 

Draco watched, very upset by the exchange but unsure how to break it without being pulled in, as Gaara had been verbally assaulted and just stood there and took it. That had been the worst part.

 

Gaara had left shortly after that, and while Draco would have rather gone with him and not interacted with his otherwise perfectly good Potions professor and Head of House, if he did that then there had been no reason for Gaara to go through that. As soon as his questions had been answered and Snape had let himself back into his quarters to consider whether or not to take up drinking as a hobby, Draco had rushed onwards to the dorms, hoping that Gaara would still be there.

 

Otherwise there would be a good chance he wouldn’t see him again until classes tomorrow.

 

Not a whole lot upset Gaara, as far as Draco was aware, but this had surely penetrated his thick skin, and he wanted to be of some comfort to his friend. With this in mind, he was surprised to find his roommate sat on his bed reading, as if nothing at all had happened.

 

Gaara’s head had briefly popped up when Draco entered, but had sunk back into the obligatory thick book shortly thereafter.

 

“Gaara, are you okay?”

 

Gaara looked up again, assessed what the questioned referred to and answered, ‘I am fine. I am used to those words.’

 

“You’re used to them?” Draco had never properly understood the abject terror Gaara inspired. Sure, he was a little intense at times, and he tended to stare, but where had all of this ‘killer’ talk come from? If it had come from that ridiculous (and fraudulent) Divination teacher, his father would be having words about her. About time, too.

 

‘When I was growing up, in my home village, my brother and sister were the only people who never wanted to kill me. The others said worse things about me and to me. So I’m used to it.’

 

Gaara looked on at Draco’s stunned expression and decided to leave for the night. His friend’s speechlessness wouldn’t last much longer, and this sort of thing was the reason he had tried to avoid discussing anything personal from his home world. He wanted to trust his friend, but there were some truths that he just didn’t want to have to confront here.

 

Here, he was a child, albeit an unsettling and violent one. He wasn’t the boy who had murdered men, women, and children, and who was host to a great evil inside of him.

 

It was a nice illusion that he was content to enjoy for a little while longer, until the bubble burst.

 

He got to his feet and quickly stepped out of the room for the night. He’s show up again in the morning when there were too many people around to bring up such a sensitive subject.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Gaara, on the frequent nights he spent wandering the halls of Hogwarts rather than sleeping, and excepting the one night a month when he did something _else_ , he would explore some of the unused rooms the castle had in spades. Most of them were dusty and abandoned classrooms, a couple were simply storage for half-rotted furniture.

 

He had found two treasures so far, an armoury in the deepest reaches of the dungeon, though most of the magically enchanted weaponry and armour had already begun to rust; and he had found a second, much smaller, library. Most of the books were written in Middle-English or Latin, and a handful were written in much older or more obscure languages.

 

With things likes this open to the tenacious, exploring student, Gaara had become interested in what laid behind the locked doors. Well… the well-locked doors. The armoury, the library, and about half of the unused or abandoned rooms had all been locked, with their heavy iron bonds long since rusting or losing their counterpart keys. Gaara had made his way into each of these rooms as easily as he had the ones with no fastenings or even those missing their doors.

 

The ‘well-locked doors’ had been warded against lock picking or brute force, to a degree. Gaara had little doubt he could burst through the simple barriers they had enacted to keep curious children out, but he didn’t want to cause any (further) undue alarm, or make them double the security.

 

Most of these warded doors led to uninteresting places like professors’ quarters or offices, which Gaara knew already. So when he found an unfamiliar door on the third floor that definitely didn’t belong to any of the teachers or staff at the school, he wanted to know what was so important it had been blocked off so thoroughly. He even went to the trouble of asking a couple of people about the room, but they all responded that it was probably just an empty room, since they hadn’t tried to break in themselves and didn’t know about the magic stopping such attempts.

 

So, without a key he couldn’t get in, and that left him with only one option if he wanted to proceed.

 

Gaara approached Hagrid the next morning.

 

‘I need a key.’

 

Hagrid spent a moment processing. “A key?”

 

‘You are the Keeper of the Keys.’ Gaara was patient when dealing with idiots, having practiced on every trip to Konoha. That village bred them, it seemed. Not that Kankuro was much better.

 

“Oh, you need a key!” Usually, when communicating with people in his unique way, Gaara allowed for an extra process of translation to occur within his conversation partners, for them to take in what they had read. With Hagrid, it was as if he needed another step or two before he could quite grasp what people had told him.

 

‘Yes.’

 

“Um, what do you need a key for?”

 

‘To open a door.’

 

Unfortunately, for different reasons, mind you, Gaara also took a little time to quite understand other people, especially those not on the same intellectual level as himself.

 

So the conversation continued in this disjointed way with neither of them quite sure what was going on or why it was taking so long to say it, but eventually Gaara was entrusted with a large cumbersome brass key that should, if Hagrid knew the school as well as he said he did, open Gaara’s problem door.

 

It hadn’t really occurred to Hagrid that the sensible third-year was asking for a key to locked door, and that perhaps he should have asked Dumbledore or one of the other senior staff members why the door was locked. Concurrently, it didn’t occur to Hagrid that the door, situated in a school, was locked precisely to keep out students, students like Gaara who’d he’d just handed the key to.

 

Being who he was, he wasn’t troubled by his slip up until Dumbledore reprimanded him a week later.

 

Gaara was happy that he had tried the upfront approach first, before resorting to the convoluted plan already formulating in his head to rob Hagrid of his keys when he was asleep. Instead, that night he returned to the mystery door and slid the key into the decayed lock.

 

It took a bit of force to push the hulking door out of the way, it clearly had not been opened in a few years. Instead of the school treasury that he had been secretly hoping for (more for the validation of his efforts than for any personal greed or gain. If he wanted money, he could just rob Draco for less effort…) he was underwhelmed by what he saw.

 

A mirror.

 

Granted, it was probably one of the most impressive and ornate mirrors he had seen in his life, if a tad dusty, but it was no more than that. The frame was golden, but wooden, and there were no treasures, weapons or books around or behind the thing. This led to one conclusion, that the mirror itself was somehow special. Most probably enchanted in some unforeseeable way.

 

He debated whether to risk looking into the reflection, lest he fall afoul of some curse or other. He had enough torments in his life already.

 

Gaara told himself that no matter the three-headed hellhounds in the grounds or soul sucking monster patrolling the perimeter, there was no way the eccentric headmaster would allow anything so overtly dangerous as a cursed mirror into his school without some sturdier protections in place that the watchful eye of Hagrid. Walking back in front of the enormous piece, he first read the inscription but couldn’t make heads or tails of it.

 

His Latin was passable by now, but he was not experienced in the languages of this world.

 

Standing before it, shoulders squared, he let his gaze drift downwards to see his own reflection. And he saw himself standing there, and…

 

And he gasped.

 

He stared at the image on the mirror for more hours than he knew, and when the sun started to peak in through the window, he finally roused himself enough to leave. He left with a promise to return very soon and see the wondrous image again.

 

In the evening, he dragged Draco up to the third floor after dinner without proffering any explanation and into the sealed room. The blond hadn’t been worried beyond missing the end of dinner until they reached the deserted third floor corridor. Ever since his first year, no one willing went to this area of the school.

 

The rules no longer prohibited students going to the third floor corridor, but since the rumours of what had been kept on that floor persisted, none of the teenagers had been willing to risk it. Draco had heard a rather unsettling rumour that there had been an enormous Cerberus in one of the rooms, and it had come from a begrudgingly reliable source.

 

He kept this to himself since he didn’t want to appear as more of a coward to Gaara than he already was.

 

Draco’s eyes darted to the back of Gaara’s head to look for a sign that he had heard Draco let out a loud sigh of relief when he saw not a demonic dog or any of the hundred other things suspected of being here. Instead there stood a single ornate mirror that Gaara clearly wanted Draco to see.

 

It was hard to see Gaara’s sand writing in the unlit room, but he just about made out ‘Look at your reflection in this mirror. It shows you nice things.’ Had Gaara been any of his other friends, Draco would have been instantly suspicious at such a claim, but he figured he was relatively safe with present company.

 

He looked into the mirror, and when the magic took effect he was presented with an image he couldn’t describe as anything but wondrous, too.

 

He had no idea what the exact nature of the mirror’s spell was, and looking at what he hoped would be his future, he could only pray that it was somehow related to Divination. Before him stood… him, only he was taller and more regal. He was dressed in robes even his father would have envied. Speaking of his dad, both of his parents were stood behind him, smiling in an uncharacteristically open fashion.

 

They were all stood in the atrium of the Ministry and Draco was the newly appointed Minister for Magic, his parents supporting behind him and the flashes of cameras announcing the press conference in progress. Not only that, next to him stood Gaara who also looked older, dressed as… Well, he was wearing smart robes. Draco couldn’t imagine what Gaara would be when he grew up, except intimidating.

 

There Draco was, as he stared at his reflection, surrounded by his friends and family, having achieved the most important position in British Wizarding politics. It was lovely. But seeing the look on Gaara’s face, he somehow doubted his friend was looking upon the same scene.

 

“Gaara, what is this mirror? Is it a window to the future?” He could hardly tear his eyes away long enough to direct his question to the red-head.

 

‘No. I believe it simply shows happy fantasies.’

 

“How can you tell?”

 

‘Because it shows things that can never be. Not any more.’

 

“Oh… If you’re sure. It’s just, I can see myself there, but I’m older, and I’m Minister for Magic, and you’re there!” Draco went off into a spirited explanation of what the mirror was showing him, including all sorts of details he picked out in his desperate fantasising. “What can you see?”

 

Gaara had continued to stare at the mirror all through Draco’s speech and didn’t turn to address Draco even when his sand floated into the letters ‘Just a pleasant, impossible dream. Nothing more.’ He had the smallest smile on his lips that Draco might have missed were it not for the almost full moon.

 

He wanted to press for an answer, for the millionth time, but this didn’t seem like a good time. It never seemed like a good time to pry into Gaara’s personal life and past, but seeing that smile he just couldn’t.

 

They both spent a long while looking into the mirror that evening before Draco was ready to leave for the night.

 

“Gaara, are you coming?”

 

Gaara turned to him finally and shook his head slowly.

 

Draco went to sleep that night, his mind going straight back to the sweet dream he had been able to see and experience consciously.

 

Gaara had never really had sweet dreams before. His sleep, long time coming that it was, usually resulted in either confronting Shukaku, reliving memories of past atrocities, or experiencing black emptiness until he awoke. The latter was most common, but none of the options approached happy dreams.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

The moon was speeding up its orbit, Gaara thought. He believed this so strongly he had suggested it to the Astronomy professor, this hypothesis, but she had laughed at him. Gaara would have suspected some sort of conspiracy were it not for the corroborating calendar that also insisted a full month had passed since his last transformation.

 

Sure, it felt like he had been cursed with this confounded bow around his neck for at least a year already, but otherwise it seemed like only a week had passed since he had last suffered his monthly humiliation.

 

In January he had been kidnapped by Luna and beribboned, in February he had almost been eaten by a giant spider and ‘forced’ to play with a great big werewolf. He weighed up his options all of the day before, but eventually reason won over pride and he was forced to admit he probably shouldn’t rush back into the forest.

 

To be safe, he transformed as far away from the Ravenclaw dormitories as he could just to be on the safe side, which just so happened to be in the Dungeons. An unexpected issue that this placement caused was the proximity to Slytherin and the corresponding patrol route that Snape followed.

 

He was assigned to guard/watch the Dungeons and lower castle most evenings, except those nights when the other lazier professors had the night off. Snape could only dream of such luxury.

 

This night, he was in his monthly foul mood after having been forced to _give_ away one of his most profitable potions to one of the people he hated most in the world. He couldn’t wait until Lupin got himself fired and would have to go back to struggling to pay for the Wolfsbane Potion.

 

Recently, irony of ironies, the looming threat of Sirius Black had kept most of his students in check since they didn’t want to risk sneaking about the halls when a murderer might try to break in. As such, when he saw a small movement in the dark, he moved swiftly after it. Mrs Norris never strayed into the Dungeons when Snape was patrolling them, mostly since she was never apart from Filch for long and they tended to leave Snape on his own, but he also believed Mrs Norris didn’t like him.

 

None of his Slytherins owned a cat currently, being an exceptionally rare pet among the snakes, so he knew whatever he was chasing shouldn’t be down here.

 

Gaara had rounded a corner only to spot his hated Head of House standing there, presumably on the lookout for intruders, curfew breakers, and other oddities. Since Gaara was two of three, and because of their hate-hate relationship, he had automatically turned tail and darted back behind cover. He hid with his back to the wall, carefully poking his snout back out to check if Snape had spotted him.

 

The incoming black smudge in the gloomy hall was indicative enough, so Gaara took off full pelt down the corridor. Unfortunately, rushing into a sprint led to his soft pads and claws just slipping on the polished stone underfoot. He managed to get going like a shot before Snape could reach him, but it meant that Snape once again saw his humongous tail turning the next corner.

 

Thus began the chase between Snape and his most hated student in a compromising state. If only he knew…

 

It took five adrenaline-fuelled minutes before Gaara was able to get enough of a lead to dart into an unlocked classroom. The funny thing was that before he had transformed, he had told himself that he would stay in the empty room and not go running through the castle again. That decision had lasted all of five minutes after his brain had turned into an animal’s.

 

That chase was not the only one that Gaara had to endure that night. For some reason, Harry had taken it upon himself to see what the mysterious, trouble-making transfer student had been up to on the full moon, evading Professor Snape like he had been.

 

Harry often watched the school through his map, and had seen Gaara out past curfew more often than he had seen him actually in his dorm room at night. He had always ignored this because he didn’t appear to be doing much of anything, either staying in one abandoned room alone all night, or walking around the castle aimlessly.

 

It was so boring he could never watch it for long without falling asleep or looking somewhere else.

 

But watching Gaara running away from Snape and hiding just seemed too suspicious. Maybe he was finally making his move, whatever that might entail. So Harry had taken his cloak and his map and descended into the Dungeons.

 

So it would seem his misfortunes came by twos on these nights. If it wasn’t an acromantula and werewolf, it was Snape and then Potter. Except, Gaara wouldn’t count on Potter saving him from the Potions Master, hero complex aside.

 

Gaara had been waiting in the empty room, planning his next move when the door had swung open and he heard/smelt someone enter the room. His improved senses could tell an invisible teenager had entered the room, but they had no sensory memory to reference back to, so he had no idea who it was. However, seeing as it was a teenager it was the middle of the night, and it was already causing him trouble, he correctly guessed it was either Potter or one of his stooge friends.

 

Harry was in the classroom, under his cloak, but he couldn’t see where Gaara was. He had hoped to do this observation stealthily, though he didn’t think about the door that would have appeared to have magically opened by itself, however, he was staring into the darkened room and he couldn’t see Gaara hiding in the back amongst the piles of chairs.

 

Harry put away his map and walked further into the room, trying to peer under the furniture to see where Gaara was hiding. Being about as far from a ninja as it was possible to be (a damning description considering the wide… variety counted amongst the shinobi ranks in Gaara’s world), after Harry had opened a door while invisible, he failed to take note that his invisible feet were not only making noise but also marking the dust along the floor.

 

With these factors, Gaara accurately located the invisible threat. He slowly circled around, using his small size to his advantage and moving through the smallest gaps in the direction of the door. Luckily, whatever means Potter had used to locate him had only taken him to the general area Gaara was hiding in. He managed to circle around the unwitting boy and run out the door before Harry had even though to check his map to pinpoint his target’s location.

 

When he did, he understood that Gaara had somehow hidden from sight too and had snuck past his and out the door. Seeing the direction Gaara was headed, he tucked his cloak into his trousers and took off running, needing all of the speed he could muster. He had seen Gaara running on the map before and it seemed like he was moving even faster than usual.

 

He was on to something!

 

Gaara was on all fours, sprinting down the hall, running towards the stairs. He had wanted to stay away from the upper floors and Luna at all costs, but running the risk of encountering her was better than risk being caught by Harry. His other _other_ blond friend might have been deranged, but that was better than being captured by an enemy. Well, he wasn’t sure if he wanted to credit Potter with such a title, but he certainly wasn’t a friend.

 

Potter was an unfriendly acquaintance.

 

Granted, he didn’t seem like the type to hurt an unfamiliar and innocent (ha!) animal, but the greater danger was his transformation. He couldn’t let someone he was on poor terms with discover his secret.

 

What Gaara didn’t know was that Harry wasn’t following a strange animal around, that he had somehow tracked; instead, he was following Gaara but he had yet to catch a glimpse of the boy.

 

The high speed chase around the castle continued for an hour. No matter how fast or evasive Gaara was, he was always found by Harry, who was entirely lacking in stamina to keep up with the trained shinobi/animal. More often than not, the chase turned into a protracted game of hide & seek, which Gaara didn’t think was fair considering Harry clearly had some sort of magical parchment to track him and was in his own body. There was no way a civilian child could have come close to catching Gaara if he was in his own body.

 

The fuzzy little psychopath nearly had a heart attack when he skidded around a corner and saw Luna standing there, facing the other direction. First Snape, then Potter, now Luna. All he needed now was Draco, Sirius and Orochimaru to join the chase and his night would be complete.

 

His luck won out for a change as he was able to slink back the way he had come before she noticed him.

 

As he continued his cat and mouse act with Potter, Gaara knew that these transformations were getting to be too much of a liability.

 

Sometime around two in the morning, the unexpectedly tenacious Gryffindor had given up his chase as he became convinced that Gaara was messing with him. Whatever the slimy Slytherin had been trying to hide he could have easily hidden and then confronted Harry with impunity. Clearly Gaara had been running all around the castle to keep Harry awake.

 

The next morning, Harry was beyond tired, being repeatedly reawakened by Hermione and Ron. It was that morning that the trio realised why Gaara had those bags around his eyes, seeing some lesser versions around Harry’s after one night of trying to keep up with him. Hermione used the word ‘insomniac’ which Ron liked, mostly because it made the Slytherin sound crazy. 

 

It took Gaara a further half hour before he had realised Harry wasn’t following him anymore and he could finally make his way back to the Dungeons. The running hadn’t been all too bad for his overflowing energy, but the stress was driving him into the ground. He hadn’t rushed on his way back down the school, considering all the while when it would become an appropriate action to go on a good ol’ killing spree.

 

He went back to his changing place and prepared for the shift. He still had hours before it would happen, so he tried something he hadn’t before: sleeping in animal form. Granted, he spent the better part of an hour setting traps around the room to stop anyone sneaking up on him while he was out.

 

It was more of a nap, lasting only two hours, but it was among the most peaceful night’s sleep he had ever gotten. It was what Gaara imagined sleep was like for normal people, none of the screaming, demons or mental battles to retain his sanity. When he woke up again, he check and found none of the traps had been disturbed and he had less than an hour until he changed again.

 

When he did change back into his small human body, he once more questioned his sanity in that form. After a night where he had done little else but flee from multiple pursuers, he had _napped_ in the Dungeons.

 

Maybe he should just taken heed of that instinct that had told him to take a potion and hide in his trunk all night. Something to calm him, maybe sedate his ‘wild side’ a little while he was curled up tight in his trunk in his room. He could even knock Draco out and just stay in the room, but that ran the risk of one of Draco’s braver friends knocking on the door. If Draco didn’t answer they might get a Prefect to check on them.

 

Luna had not given up her search. She never would, she told herself.

 

She had looked all night, avoiding the patrolling teachers and ghosts with the ease that came with practicing. She had found faint signs all over the castle, stray tufts of fur, scratch marks on the stone, all since the last cleaning a few days before.

 

Her housemates had told her she was entering into a new form of weird; her father had applauded her training. If she wanted to grow up to track rare and exotic creatures, there would be no better practice. And he was selfishly rather eager to meet/examine this animal after his precious daughter had begun to obsess over it.

 

He remembered the first creature he had obsessed over. Over the course of three years, two broken broomsticks, a search by Aurors and sixteen angry Centaurs, he had found the beast and met his darling wife. And the less said about the two Centaurs who weren’t angry, the better.

 

Luna had followed the signs of her dear, lost, fluffy pet down into the bowels of the school, and there she found a room she thought it must be hiding in.

 

“Animum Revelo.” Luna whispered, pointing her wand directly at the door. As she had practiced at Hagrid’s hut, the door started to glow a little before fading a little, assuring her that an animal was most definitely in there.

 

Luna, crazy though some might describe her, wasn’t so out of her mind that she wanted to heedlessly pursue her lost pet and risk scaring it even further. The thing was clearly skittish, solitary, and didn’t like being trapped, so she couldn’t run into the room flinging spells. She wasn’t a Gryffindor after all.

 

With that in mind, she sat down in front of the door and hoped none of the teachers had recognised her pattern and decided check if she had stayed in bed after midnight on this particular night. She would wait until the morning if she had to, she had even been napping during the afternoons in the past couple of days to ensure she wouldn’t fall asleep.

 

In the room, Gaara was crawling in his skin, his animal mind fully used being allowed to run around freely by now. If he did want to lock himself up for these things, he would most definitely need tranquilising. When the sun rose, Gaara decided to devote some of his research time to try and resolve this worsening issue of the full moon nights. He had a month until his next one, however long that would _actually_ be, so he figured that would ample opportunity to fix the issue.

 

It was after Gaara had put on his trousers and was pulling on his shirt that Luna crept conspicuously into the room. Both he and her froze staring at each other, her from behind the door and he with his fingers resting on a button he had been in the middle of threading.

 

“Oh.” Luna said, her mind whirring back to life after the short crash.

 

Gaara lips mimed the same but he just ended up doubling over and coughed half a lung up. This broke both of them out of their reverie and she fully entered the room, less bothered about Gaara’s state of partial dress and instead focussing on the bow clearly tied around his neck and the implications of it.

 

“You’re a were-…tanuki?”

 

Gaara had stopped coughed, and instead had stood back up straight and resumed buttoning his shirt. He was hoping the repetitive activity would stop a blush from forming. It was because he had walked-in on when he was half-naked, but entirely because one of the people he was most afraid of finding out this secret had just done so in spectacular fashion.

 

He didn’t address the question as he continued to work at his shirt, waiting until it was fully buttoned and he then located and called upon his sand to write out his responses in the early morning light.

 

‘Yes.’

 

“Oh.” Luna repeated. “Sorry for chasing you.” That was the best she could come up with.

 

Gaara ignored the last comment and instead pulled on his shoes, longing for the comfort and flexibility that he had enjoyed with his shinobi sandals. When they were on and his cloak had been donned, he stood and approached Luna, the frustratingly blank expression still firmly (and resolutely) in place.

 

Luna watched him approach, feeling herself succumb to the widespread fear of him for just a second, until he stood before her and pulled his shirt collar down a inch, emphasising the blow material spelled on his neck.

 

“Oh!” She said for the third time. “Yes. Sorry. For that.” She stuttered out, pulled out her wand again and pointing it at his throat. A muttered spell that he didn’t care to concentrate on later and she was untying it. As she did, she stared at the fading scar on his neck for longer than he thought appropriate, so he dispelled her focus with a well placed hand rubbing the phantom sensation from his now bare neck.

 

She tucked the material in her pocket absently and then fell back against the door, still shocked and saddened by the revelation.

 

‘Since I arrived here, the full moons have had a strange effect on me. My body changes but my mind doesn’t.’ He didn’t mention the instincts for important reasons…

 

“So…” Luna’s inner Ravenclaw was booting back up, finally, “Does the transformation hurt?”

 

‘No. It did the first time but now it is quicker and easier.’

 

“Have there been any other changes?”

 

‘No. Except my throat hurts in the mornings, lately.’

 

“Your throat? Where you have the scar?”

 

Gaara nodded.

 

“Interesting. Has the length of time you are changed gotten longer?”

 

‘No. I turn into that form when the moon rises and back again when the sun rises.’

 

“So there’s very little chance that it will become permanent.” Luna sounded disappointed. “If it did become permanent, you would still be welcome at my home. My father already said yes if you were already domesticated.”

 

‘No thank you.’

 

Luna looked disappointed by that response, but eventually her scientist mind flared back up. “I’ve never heard of a were- anything other than a wolf before. Perhaps it is a strain of the curse native to your country.”

 

‘No, I have never encountered or heard of this before.’

 

“Then, would you like me to help you research the condition. If there is anything in the school library, I’m sure we could find it. Or would you rather wait and see if it goes away when you go back to your own world?”

 

Gaara looked into her eyes, quirking an eyebrow in question.

 

“I’ve seen your research. You were either from another world or running to one.”

 

‘I will read about this on my own. Thank you.’ Anything to end the discussion of his disability.

 

“Then, I could help you hide your transformations. You weren’t too hard to track down and you can’t use your sand, can you?”

 

Gaara shook his head.

 

“Then I could help keep you-” She refrained from saying ‘keep you safe’ since that would only inflame Gaara’s already bruised ego, “away from any dangerous people.”

 

‘Thank you. I will consider that.’ Which meant he would tell her to stay away from him during those nights, under the guise of diverting attention. With any luck, this morning would be the last mention between them of this supremely disturbing subject.

 

“So, how long is your tail exactly? I never got to measure it.”

 

Or not.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Harry had watched Gaara the next night but it happened to be one of the rare occasions that the insomniac weirdo spent the night in his own room, slumbering next to Malfoy. It was an unsettling thought that two-dimensional antagonist characters like Malfoy and Gaara actually had a bedroom and beds and they slept and read books.

 

He shook his head lest he start considering his enemies as people.

 

The night after that, Gaara had snuck out again, and he was staying in one place consistently this time, on the third floor. He tried to wake Ron up to help chase down his target, but the ginger said things Mrs Weasley would be better off never hearing about, and Harry had to go out alone.

 

Even if he could have gotten past the stairs that blocked boys entering the girl’s dorms, he didn’t hold out much hope that Hermione would be any more interested in Gaara’s late night comings and goings than Ron. She wouldn’t swear as much, but she might hex him.

 

He was on his way, periodically checking the map to make sure Gaara hadn’t somehow caught wind of him coming from afar, when he saw a name he had only heard of. He wondered if the Marauders were really all they were cracked up to be since he knew for a fact that Peter Pettigrew was dead.

 

When he saw the dead name moving about, he then wondered if perhaps the man’s ghost had somehow ended up in Hogwarts. Did ghosts show up on the map?

 

When he got to the general area of the name, he found no ghosts and no long dead family friends, instead he was found himself by Professor Snape, who confiscated his map and got insulted by it. Lupin showed up and covered for him, but then lectured him about keep the map with Sirius Black running around.

 

Harry hadn’t really considered the danger the map presented, it had just been a godsend for snooping and avoiding curfew.

 

After Harry had been dropped off at the Gryffindor entrance, Lupin quickly opened his old map and looked all over for the rat’s name. He looked all over but he didn’t see Pettigrew anywhere. He knew Harry wouldn’t lie about something like this, so the rat had obviously seen Harry with the map earlier and run away to one of the blind spots or out into the grounds.

 

Still, if he resurfaced, the map would make catching him much easier. He considered giving it to Gaara since the boy hardly slept, was a fast runner, and commanded that useful sand. Then again, Gaara was scary enough. At a certain point his power should be limited.

 

That sounded like a responsible teacher’s reasoning, right?

 

Meanwhile, Gaara was admiring his reflection in a particularly narcissistic fashion. He had asked if Draco wanted to come and see it again, but the boy had said he would see it another time, he was tired. Weakling.

 

“I thought Mr Potter would be the last student I had to warn about this mirror. I fear perhaps I will have to make good on my longstanding plans to move it out of the castle.”

 

Of all the people Gaara would have guessed would enter the room in the middle of the night, the Headmaster was low on the list.

 

“I understand you’ve come here few times since Hagrid unknowingly gave you the key. This mirror isn’t dangerous, I assure you, but it can lead people to their deaths. As I have told numerous people, this mirror has caused men to waste away in front of it, fruitlessly hoping for the dreams it shows to come true.”

 

‘Fools.’ Gaara didn’t bother spelling out any other words. He did, however, turn to face the powerful wizard.

 

“I suppose. But you must admit, it is enticing. I know I still struggle with the Mirror of Erised, years after coming into possession of it. A more responsible man might have had it shattered but I never could bring myself to do it.”

 

Dumbledore conjured a chair out of thin air and sat down next to Gaara, looking at his reflection.

 

“It is a beautiful and fascinating object. And not only is there the image in front of you, but the questions of what others might be seeing. When I first found this mirror, a long time ago, a friend and I tried to guess what the other saw. I guessed his but he never could see what I saw.” The old man was a little wistful, obviously enjoying the opportunity to be nostalgic.

 

“Why, might I ask, did you say that those who had become enchanted by what was shown in the mirror were fools, Gaara?”

 

‘This mirror only shows a person what they want, not how they were, are or could ever be. It is just a pretty picture.’

 

Albus seemed to understand, “Ah, then it seems you see something similar to my own vision. I am sorry to say I do not know you well enough to offer a guess as to what you might see when you look at your reflection in the mirror. You are a mystery to me, I have to admit.”

 

Gaara look back at him after his eyes had drifted towards the mirror.

 

“I have had more people question me over your admittance than almost any choice I have made in this school in twenty years, except perhaps my handling of last year’s difficulties with the Chamber of Secrets. And possibly the year before in the aftermath of the attempted theft of the Philosophers Stone.” The weary man sighed long and deep. “It has been a difficult few years.

 

“It will come as no shock to you, Gaara, I’m sure, that you are an outsider in this school. A stranger to this country as well. But I did not accept you to this school just to keep an eye on you. I invited you to attend this school because you were a child alone in a strange country with nowhere to go.”

 

‘I’m not a child.’ Gaara told himself his vice wouldn’t have sounded petulant if he had said it aloud.

 

“I suppose not. Not in many of the ways we characterise childhood, but no matter what you have done, or how much of it shows in your face, I still see a child. I am just a naïve old man.”

 

Gaara didn’t speak to that.

 

“I will be having the mirror moved tomorrow morning. I liked to come down here and look at it every now and then, but I know there is no place in this castle you couldn’t follow it to if you wanted, even if you understand the folly of the things you see. And it is about time I stopped looking at it myself.”

 

Gaara turned back to the scene in front of him, savouring the sight for the remaining hours until it was taken away.

 

“Thank you for listening, Gaara. If there is ever anything you want to talk about, please don’t hesitate to come to me.”

 

‘Thank you.’

 

Gaara hadn’t turned to address Albus, nor did he acknowledge his leaving, just continuing to rapturously stare at the Mirror of Erised.

 

The next day it was indeed gone, hidden in one of the school’s many Gringotts vaults.

 

0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0

 

Omake:

 

It had been a few days since his secret had been revealed to Luna so he was still avoiding being anywhere near her without a buffer close by, and he was trying not to get too close to the Headmaster since their uncomfortably open conversation two days before. As such, he entered the Great Hall with reluctance only after Draco promised he would clear a space for them to eat without any crowding.

 

Upon entering, he could see Draco had made good on threatening the surrounding Slytherins to move, or simply telling them who was coming. That observation didn’t last long as his attention was quickly diverted to the pair of orange-haired twins fast approaching.

 

The Weasley twins, older brother of Potter’s lackey, he understood, were dressed in waiter’s uniforms and were wearing thin pointed moustaches.

 

“Good morning, mousier Gaara.” One said with a heavy and arguably racist fake accent.

 

“We ave your table right over here.” The other continued the obnoxious play.

 

Knowing that these two feared him as much as anyone, he didn’t fight being led to a single place set on a small table off to the side of the other tables, with a white table cloth, candles and silverware. He sat down and one of them flicked the serviette over his lap and started to pour the water as if it was wine, even asking him to taste it before pouring a full glass.

 

Of course, this stunt had drawn the attention of just about every student and staff member in the hall, and the majority thought the twins were signing their own death warrants by pulling a prank on Gaara.

 

What they didn’t know was that Gaara was being singled out as the only person not being pranked.

 

Gaara, while confident he was in no danger, was bewildered by the act as the twins continued in serving him his breakfast, commenting all the while in the accent that indicated neither had ever been to France. Before anyone could think to ask what they were doing or look for the punch line, they heard it.

 

It started with the Slytherins whispering to each other turning into literal hisses. It was just a few at first, trying to say something only to turn and check if anyone else was experiencing the same baffling symptom. In minutes, every Slytherin was loudly hissing incoherently (according to Harry Potter, who said he couldn’t understand a Parsle-word they were saying.)

 

The Gryffindors’ laughter and mocking turned into growls and roars as if they were lions soon enough, signally a terrible cacophony to start. The Slytherin continued their hisses, mostly at the staff table and at the obvious culprits still serving Gaara. The Gryffindors were split between obvious gaiety and anger at their mischievous Weasleys.

 

Then the Ravenclaws started cawing and the Hufflepuffs started making whiney growling noises like badgers. The Hufflepuffs were understandably the most upset by this prank, their House animal not being the most majestic creature.

 

Gaara wondered why he had been spared, or if he had been. It wouldn’t be clear since a mute snake would sound about the same as a mute human.

 

“The Wealseys did not want to risk your wrath, mousier Gaara.” One of the French accent chimed in.

 

They had snuck into the kitchens that very morning and managed to spike the pumpkin juice with a potion they had spent months reading up on, brewing and testing.

 

Gaara was wondering why they had bothered sparing him at all now, since it made no difference.

 

Until he saw the Slytherin start to panic all the more, their hisses rising in tempo. He saw the closest one to them showing their closest neighbour their newly forked tongue. Each of the Slytherins were now sporting thing, snake tongues, still hissing incomprehensively.

 

The Gryffindors didn’t laugh or cheer (with their roars) this time, anticipating their own humiliation soon to come. They were right to hold off their celebration since the first red mane grew shortly thereafter, followed by everyone else at the table. They roared even louder, especially the girls who did not appreciate the extra body hair.

 

One seventh year tried to spell the fur off of them, but as soon as it was cut off, it grew back around his neck and then on his head as well, warning everyone else from trying the same.

 

Then came the Ravenclaws, who grew black feathers all over their arms. Some were glad they had not been given beaks instead, but the rest were just as indignant as the other Houses. Curiously, one second year blond girl was flapping her arms in an apparent effort to fly. Unsuccessfully.

 

The Hufflepuffs got off rather lightly in appearance, merely gaining a pair of white strips in their hair, or black ones for the blonds. That did not register in their continued and loud complaints to the teachers to reverse this and punish the twins.   

 

At the staff table, the teachers were mostly glaring at the ones responsible or trying to rein in the student body who sounded like an irate zoo. Dumbledore and Lupin were the only ones openly smiling. In fact, Lupin looked to be laughing a little, but would periodically stop himself.

 

When a semblance of order was restored, it was revealed by the entirely unapologetic twins that the effects would last until tomorrow morning. They were assigned detentions spanning into next year and would receive particularly harrowing Howlers the next morning from their mother.

 

It was a hilarious day for Gaara, now not the only mute person in his classes who were forbidden from making ‘animal noises’ in classes. He thought the punishment would have been worse but the prank had done wonders for reducing the amount of classroom chatter.

 

The widespread belief that Gaara had been at least complicit if not an accomplice in the prank had further eased his stigma, as had the rumour that was spreading that he had been responsible for the smoke bomb and broken heating system in Slytherin earlier in the year.

 

Snape had been all for assigning some punishment to Gaara, but Dumbledore had just told him any detention assigned would be served with Snape so he had dropped the matter. And there hadn’t been any proof.

 

Despite the anger of every student, the Howlers from their parents, the detentions too numerous to count, and the House points lost, Fred and George counted that prank as being one of their best birthdays ever. Though they still contested that they shouldn’t have been punished at all.

 

They had shouted ‘April Fools’ after all!

 

The next day, as two people were getting Howlers and everyone else was enjoying their newly regained ability to speak to each other, the first thing Draco said to his best friend was “Gaara, stop whittling your wand already!”


	11. A New Strain

The fallout from the Weasley twins’ masterpiece prank had been as spectacular as they had hoped. The different Houses either consigning themselves to abject humiliation by trying to communicate their anger or having to hold their tongue for a day. Even as they were both assaulted by various animal noises in their classes, concealing the sort of language that would have seen everyone lose House points, they laughed their silly laughs.

 

They had concluded at the end of the day, as they served their first detention of a very long stint, that it had been both a banner Aprils Fools and birthday. When their friends and housemates had started up again the next day with their accusations and insults, they had loudly pondered what they might do for next year.

 

More than a few would have pegged them for Slytherins had their inclinations been more malicious.

 

Not everyone hated the red-heads for their ultimately harmless prank. A couple Hufflepuffs, one or two Ravenclaws and a minority of Gryffindors had seen the humour of their situations, if only in hindsight.

 

Luna had rather enjoyed both the feathers and the bird speak. She had, what she considered, a very lively debate with an owl during her lunch period. She believed she had won in spirit if not content. The barn owl had an incoherent dialect but she didn’t want to offend him so she hadn’t mentioned it.

 

Draco had been indignant, threatening to notify his father of the trespass for the first time in months. Gaara noted that Draco hadn’t actually written to Lucius about the prank, but it was still interesting to note how Draco regressed when faced with humiliation.

 

Gaara thought back to his own humiliations and how his father might have reacted to hearing about them. It likely would have led to a number of extra assassins being sent to kill Gaara during his time of weakness.

 

He would have asked, but his father was dead. Gaara wiped the smile off of his face before anyone saw it and thought him a fool for smiling at nothing.

 

“It was rather interesting, I suppose. Being unable to speak for a day. I think I can understand what you go through now. At least you don’t have a forked tongue, though.”

 

Gaara considered the shallow and narcissistic statement, but agreed to the last point. It did seem a little inconvenient to be sticking his tongue out all the time. And it would look ridiculous.

 

Speaking of ridiculous, those two idiotic pranksters had approached him yesterday after excluding him from their school-wide prank, to claim back their ‘pranking crown’.

 

He had no idea what they were talking about, but agreed that they could have the crown if they wanted it. They had high-fived and run off when a bunch of seventh year Slytherins had spotted them.

 

The snakes hadn’t taken to the prank in any sort of good humour, so the twins, and in fact all of the Weasleys, had become enemy number one in Slytherin. It was a mixed blessing to be knocked off of the top spot for Gaara.

 

The school returned to their prior darkened moods pretty sharply after another sighting of Sirius Black had been reported in Hogsmeade. The students had quickly forgotten their excitement or their anger and had returned to fear. Even the Slytherins were uneasy about Sirius Black because he wasn’t a regular pureblood fanatic, he was a true lunatic.

 

The teachers tried to restore order, and some even attempted to lighten the mood by mentioning the prank, the Quidditch finals coming up, or even the end of year exams. Any distraction, but the children were still spooked.

 

Gaara, as he always was after reading one of these articles about Sirius, was equal parts worried and exhausted for and by his friend in the Shack. At least his friend back in his own world was capable of getting himself out of most of the problems he got himself into. Now, if only Draco and Sirius were so resourceful or capable, Gaara could sleep soundly at night.

 

Well, he could read more comfortably at night.

 

It was over lunch that afternoon, one of the few that Gaara bothered attending, that Hagrid approached him with an invitation to tea at his hut that evening. The invitation was extended to Draco as well, but the blond snob politely declined the chance for more rock hard cakes and tea out of cups that still smelled of whatever extra-strong brandy had last filled them.

 

Hagrid wouldn’t say why he was inviting Gaara, but no one was in any doubt that Gaara would be safe enough meeting the man alone in his home.

 

Despite how powerful Gaara was understood to be, the rules still applied (as far as the teachers were concerned), so Hagrid told his student that he would come and collect him from the Slytherin common room at eight, after dinner.

 

God forbid Sirius Black run into Gaara as he was making his way to Hagrid’s home in the dark of the night!

 

When Draco had posited that scenario, albeit with less drama, Gaara _had_ wondered. Chances were, if Sirius were to encounter Gaara in a darkened hallway, he would probably scream, transform into a dog and run away with his tail between his legs. He certainly would if he had done something particularly crass to offend Gaara that day.

 

Gaara acquiesced to Hagrid’s offer, if only to be polite to one of the friendlier professors in the school. Plus Hagrid happened to be the single largest man Gaara had ever seen in either world. The Raikage was large, as were a few of the Kiri-nin he had encountered, but Hagrid was twice as tall as Gaara at least.

 

It seemed like no one in this world knew how to fight properly, certainly nowhere near the level his own could, and he had heard that Hagrid did not have access to a wand for some reason, so his threat was further diminished. But if the red-head had learned anything from his time as a fuzzy, fluffy, super plush tanuki-demon, it was to not needlessly antagonise the beings larger than you if you can avoid it.

 

Plus he needed a night away from research, homework, slaughter and Draco, and his entertainment options were otherwise quite limited.

 

Ironically, Gaara garnered a number of confused looks from his housemates when they saw him in the common room after dinner like he was supposed to be. It may have also been to do with the fact that he wasn’t with Draco and he wasn’t reading. Many had debated the Sorting Hat’s choice to place Gaara in Slytherin, partly because of his voracious reading habits, his brazen and at times plain naïve social skills, and because of the hat’s peculiar reaction to whatever was in Gaara’s head.

 

What was a strange sight quickly turned unsettling when Gaara didn’t move in five, ten, fifteen minutes… He sat perfectly still, his eyes staring straight forward, blinking only occasionally. Of course, no one approached to see if he was alright, they were more than happy to wait for Draco, their resident Gaara-handler, to come and address the issue.

 

Finally a booming knock hit the hidden door to Slytherin and a couple of the lower years started to panic, loudly exclaiming that Sirius Black was there. A few of the more senior, sensible students started to sweat when Gaara finally moved and approached the threat. He looked fearless in the face of…

 

Outside of the common room stood Rubeus Hagrid, the least threatening professor in the school by popular vote. As the undeniably strange pair walked away, the Slytherins breathed out another sigh of relief and wished for the hundredth time that Gaara had burdened another House with his insanity.

 

Their walk up through the castle wasn’t plagued by inane small talk, for which Gaara was immensely grateful. He had noticed since he stopped talking that other people often tried to fill the silence with their own voices. An awkward reflex, he imagined, but nonetheless annoying. However, perhaps because of his penchant for working with animals, or because of his simple nature, Hagrid had an estimable appreciation of prolonged silence.

 

When they got to Hagrid’s hut, he offered Gaara a cup of tea and a fresh homemade cake. He accepted the first but declined the latter. He had experienced the giant man’s baking before and imagined he would carry a fragment in his gut for years to come. The tea was no delicacy either, far too strong and using some of the generic heavy tea leaves he understood were common in this country. He longed for some real tea, not overcooked, not using these tasteless leaves, and not smelling of the whisky that had undoubtedly filled the mug before it.

 

Nevertheless, he thanked the man for the tea and began to sip it, waving off the offers of milk and honey.

 

“Thanks for coming and having a cupper tonight, Gaara. I’ve been a bit lonely lately, what with everyone on the lookout for old Sirius Black. Even the other professors have been too busy to come and pay a visit.”

 

Gaara nodded along passively.

 

“I would’ve asked Harry, Ron and Hermione to come as well, but since Harry is a target of Sirius- Black, Sirius Black, it’s too dangerous for him to leave the castle at night, even with a professor.”

 

Gaara could understand that, even if it was a little silly. Sirius was likely going to hug Harry when he next saw him… which he would agree was a cruel and evil aspiration.

 

“And the other students are too afraid of him and of the dementors to come. So it’s just been me and old Fang out here.”

 

Hagrid had finally mentioned the dog still drooling over Gaara’s lap as the surly boy ignored it.

 

“I got to admit, I have another reason for asking you out here tonight.” Hagrid said, taking another swig of his own drink which smelled of anything but tea. “I know you’ve been looking after Fluffy lately and I wanted to say thank you.”

 

Gaara perked up, wondering how much he would have to admit to.

 

“He’s awful big, but he gets real lonely out there on his own. I’m glad you go out there and play with him, even if you’re not strictly supposed to. I know you can look after yourself, no one who couldn’t would be able to play with something as big as Fluffy. I expect you went looking for him after I told you and Professor Lupin about him. Don’t blame you, either. You don’t hear about a great big three-headed dog every day.”

 

Gaara nodded.

 

“He’s an indoor pup, really, but he can’t stay in the school any more. He was scratching the floors and chasing cats. And McGonagall was afraid he might go for a student so they told me to find him a new home before the new term. I sent Norbert away, I couldn’t get rid of Fluffy too. He’s never known anyone but me.”

 

Gaara calmly sipped his tea.

 

“So I asked Professor Dumbledore, I did. I asked him very nicely if Fluffy could stay in the forest, away from the kids and that, and I would make sure he didn’t get into no trouble. He bugged the centaurs and the thestrals for a bit, but he leaves them alone now.” Hagrid had been excitedly drinking his tea as he talked, never more at home than when he was discussing one of his precious animals.

 

What Gaara didn’t tell Hagrid, and had no intention of telling him unless forced, was that he now considered Fluffy his. Hagrid had left him in the woods and Gaara had found him. He didn’t care for the animal or anything like that, he just figured he would come in handy at some point.

 

Gaara had secretly wanted a summoning animal for a little while now, but couldn’t find anyone willing to let him sign their contract. He hadn’t asked Temari, though, since the incident with her Kama-itachi’s sister was still fresh in everybody’s memories. Unfortunate.

 

“Though, the centaurs have been a touch rowdy lately. Suppose I don’t blame them, really, with all the dementors out and about. Plus they’ve never been happy about Professor L-” Hagrid stumbled, looking right at Gaara to check if he had noticed the slip, “about… erm… about the cold lately.” Hagrid settled himself back in his chair, happy that he had avoided spilling the beans on Remus.

 

‘I can imagine.’ Gaara’s sand added.

 

“Those nasty buggers have been upsetting just about everyone around here. My hippogriffs are usually such a lovely bunch,” Gaara scoffed at that, “but now I can’t let them anywhere near the student in case they attack them.”

 

Hagrid’s strange interests/obliviousness aside, Gaara did agree that the dementors that were once a nuisance had become a real danger since the beginning of the term. More and more he was finding strays wandering the forest a mile away from the demarcated patrols they should have been following around Hogwarts perimeter.

 

A couple more in the next few months would wander near the Quidditch pitch, and then not long after that they would catch the scent of all of those anxious and emotional teenagers in the castle and…

 

Well, Gaara wasn’t entirely sure even he could stop that many of them at once.

 

He would have spoken to the Headmaster about these concerns, but one look at the man’s wrinkled face over the past couple of months had said all he needed to hear. Dumbledore knew all too well how dangerous the current situation was, and for once the blame could not be laid at Sirius’ dirty feet.

 

Gaara stayed for a little under an hour with the lonely groundskeeper, discussing, one-sidedly, issues both new and old. Hagrid had spent eight minutes lamenting over the slaying of Slytherin’s basilisk last year since it had likely been the single largest snake to ever live.

 

Gaara would have enjoyed the expression on Hagrid’s face if the man could see Manda. Or any of the boss summons, come to think of it.

 

At the end of the evening, Gaara politely declined the offer of baked ‘treats’ to take back and share with his friends and said his good byes.

 

It had been a nice enough way to spend an evening. Gaara wasn’t a sentimentalist, really, but he appreciated that Hagrid was a kind man. The red-headed warrior had no desire to be surrounded by cloying acquaintances, but spending an hour or two with someone who so clearly wasn’t a Slytherin was nice too. Relaxing.

 

Draco was already asleep when he walked in, having taken an early night. Gaara could hardly be accused of being noisy, but even as silent as he was, he was an intrusive presence in any room he entered. It was part of his intimidating/’evil’ aura, he figured.

 

These weren’t observations Gaara had made about himself, mind you. Draco had flat-out told him he was intrusive and scary. Gaara had just assumed these things were linked.

 

A few days later, Gaara was on his regular rounds in the forest, killing the dementors that had strayed into his path and any acromantulas unlucky enough to wander into his line of sight.

 

He had decided after his recent conversation that he wouldn’t harm Aragog or Mosage since they had been Hagrid’s pets at one time, like Fluffy. He wasn’t interested in stealing them or trying to teach them tricks, but he wasn’t about to kill them either.

 

Plus, he had already claimed one of Hagrid’s pets, even if the man didn’t know it yet, and didn’t want to go around killing the rest.

 

The other acromantulas, though, like the one that had cornered him on the full moon, were fair game in his eyes. An abundant and killable resource like the dementors.

 

He was circling around their territory, looking for some of the larger stragglers, when he heard a thumping on the ground. It was too frequent and soft for Fluffy, not to mention miles away from where the dog usually roamed. Moments later, after Gaara had called his sand to attention, a pair of large adult centaurs galloped into the area, drawing their bows as soon as they saw him.

 

They circled around him, but he didn’t trouble himself about that. An arrow from the back was as dangerous to him as from the front. He wasn’t worried.

 

He waited until they had finished ‘surrounding’ him before crossing his arms. If they shot an arrow, he would get to hunt something new and more humanoid. Shukaku would be thrilled.

 

Neither of the two males loosed an arrow, instead, one of them trotted forward and introduced himself, “Hello, I am Firenze. We have been looking for you, Gaara.”

 

Gaara nodded.

 

“My people have tried to avoid you since you came to this land many moons ago. You are host to a great evil, and that maliciousness permeates the air around you. For those who can comprehend it, you are suffocating to be near. For those of lesser awareness, you can be alluring. The hungry wolf to the hunter, and the playful dog to the foal.”

 

Gaara had to readjust his arms lest that uncross in shock. He wasn’t so sure what the last comment about the dog had meant, but he gathered that these horse-people had somehow stumbled upon his secret. He might have killed the pair, just to be safe, but that would entail massacring the rest of the centaurs as well.

 

Why couldn’t they have just tried to kill him or something…?

 

It was never simple.

 

“We do not know what you are, the stars have been unclear, but we know you are a stranger to this place, to our stars, and you have a role to play here.”

 

‘A role?’

 

Both of the creatures flinched when the sand moved, but the one named Firenze spoke again, “I am sorry. I do not read the human language.”

 

Gaara sighed. This was a new and irritating addition to his muteness.

 

“There is disagreement in our people as to what you mean to this world, but I have elected to come and meet with you, and to tell you what we know. Very soon you will be forced to bear your soul, and in so doing you will risk it.”

 

Gaara tuned out the following diatribe about which distant star or planet was in convergence with which. He had come out this night to blow off some steam and enjoy the night air. Instead he was being told about his destiny and the danger to his soul.

 

If he wanted to listen to this sort of stuff, he would show up to more of his Divinations lessons.

 

“You are dangerous. You wear the skin of a boy but house you evil. The stars cannot offer guidance, so I have been allowed to pass our wisdom to you in the hope you might avert the disaster to come. Are paths will cross again,” He spouted off more about Mars, “For that time I will try to learn the humans writing, so that we may talk properly.”

 

Their message delivered, Gaara nodded his thanks…? Acceptance?

 

He nodded, since he couldn’t effectively communicate any other way, and they trotted away again.

 

Gaara turned ninety degrees and walked further into the acromantula territory, hoping for a big one to try and eat him. This headache was only going to get worse, so he would have to work/kill through the pain.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Classes returned to normal pretty quickly, the adolescent predispositions towards drama allowing them to move from angry, to amused, to afraid, and back to the baseline angst within the space of a couple of days. Fear and anticipations still floated in the air, but now the student body were focussing on upcoming events. Some were interested in the Summer Holidays only a few months, away, some (Ravenclaw and Hermione Granger) were eagerly awaiting the end of year exams that others were dreading, and some were focussed solely on the scheduled Quidditch finals between Gryffindor and Slytherin.

 

The match was certainly the most discussed in the Great Hall, as far as Gaara could hear. Their third match up this year, apparently even the Minister of Magic was considering attending.

 

Draco was supporting his House by turning a (sickly) shade of green whenever the match was brought up.

 

The teachers had throughout the year (and most of their careers) worked to focus their students on their schoolwork and not the myriad of distracting events and activities around the school. Other than the aforementioned group that were happily working and revising for the tests in May and June, the rest were either in denial about it or planning to deal with the issue closer to the date.

 

Draco was in the latter group, procrastinating and worrying about the wrong things. He was still stressed about his exams, not that he let anybody outside of their room know, but with the massively important Quidditch match, the ongoing Sirius Black/dementor problem, and the looming spectre of returning to his parents (read:his father) for the entire protracted summer, he just couldn’t put his mind to task.

 

Gaara wasn’t worried, though. He was a bookish person by nature, though he certainly didn’t take any real pride in that fact. In his world, it had been entirely leisurely to sit and read, even about maths or history. He hadn’t even been tested to become a genin, so sure his father was that he would be an effective killing machine.

 

He had been doing very little, reading, trying to play by himself, and then one day he was introduced to his estranged siblings and told he would be going on missions with them. When he had been told those missions might include killing, he was sold.

 

So Gaara continued to read like the books were going off, but the exams themselves were mere inconveniences for him. That said, his professors were not so blasé about his chances. His academics were not in question, other than whether he would be amongst or at the top of his year, but his practical skills were still well below average.

 

In terms of raw power, he had more than Harry Potter or Neville Longbottom (put together), but his utter lack of control or natural talent for magic had left him with the spell casting ability of a first year. He wasn’t injuring people with every spell he cast now, luckily, but he took a long time to learn any new spells and no one was sure if he was going to be up to passing into the next year.

 

It was an exceptionally rare thing, being held back a year at Hogwarts, almost as rare as a transfer student, but some of the teacher were not ruling it out. Gaara had no natural talent and a very late start, so a few argued that it would be best for him to be held back a year. Some, Snape included, rebutted that it was a very harsh move to make since he had been slowly catching up, plus _some people_ didn’t want Gaara staying in Hogwarts for an extra year.

 

As a result, excepting Snape, most of Gaara’s professors began giving him extra help and the occasional remedial lesson. Lupin felt quite gratified that others were following his example, _finally_ , even if they didn’t have to contend with the ongoing antagonism between Gaara and Harry.

 

The two boys had not come so close to blows since the beginning of their shared tutorials, but there was still clearly no love lost. It didn’t help that Harry was showcasing a prodigious talent for his spell work in front of Gaara who was struggling with the spells they had learned in a week in October.

 

In between his regular DADA tutoring, his reading, killing arachnids and dementors, occasional training, homework, these new remedial lessons, and the time he set aside for Fluffy, Gaara was very busy in April. On the bright side, it had given him the perfect excuse to ditch Luna and Draco when the mood struck, which was far more frequent with the former, who now wanted to do nothing but discuss his lamentable monthly form.

 

“Your ears are rather long, do they help your hearing?” Luna asked as she matched his quickened pace.

 

Gaara nodded, not wanting anyone to see his words if they couldn’t already hear hers.

 

“You still haven’t told me how you ended up that way. I’ve tried to read about tanuki, but they don’t appear anywhere outside of Japan, and they don’t look that much like you. You weren’t scratched by one, were you?”

 

Gaara shook his head, enduring these questions for the millionth time. Luna was obsessive.

 

“I wish my father could have seen you. But now that I know it’s you, and you don’t want people to know, I suppose he won’t get to see you in that form.” The question was there, even if there was no inflection.

 

Gaara shook his head firmly. He didn’t really feel a need to meet his tenuous-friend’s father, and certainly did not feel compelled to reveal his dark secret to the man. He didn’t particularly like Luna knowing, and he would prefer she never find out about the not-so-cute tanuki inside of him.

 

Allowing his sand to emerge, Gaara wrote: ‘I have to go to class now.’

 

“Oh, okay.” Luna said in stride, then she took a look out of the parallel window curiously. “It’s night time, you know.”

 

‘I have an extra lesson with Professor McGonagall.’

 

“Oh.” Luna actually sounded a little jealous. Gaara correctly deduced that he shouldn’t let it be known to any other Ravenclaws that he was being offered extra time with the teachers out of hours. Jealousy is a horrid thing, and without the friendship Luna had with Gaara, it might have brought out some of Ravenclaw’s less desirable characteristics.

 

With his time divided in a dozen different ways, time flew by quicker and quicker until the only meaningful marker of his time came around again. His/Draco’s calendar had told him what was coming, but he still struggled with what to do. He had to do something, the more he thought about cooping himself up during the full moon, the crazier it sounded.

 

If his human mind rebelled at the idea, he would end up chewing off his own fur when his animal mind kicked in.

 

He knew he could count on Luna’s assistance, but despite the ensured safety staying the night near her would bring, there were obvious drawbacks to that route and he wasn’t willing to walk down that path. The promised measurements and drawings alone were enough reason to avoid her that night.

 

Continuing his tradition of flip-flopping, he ended up in the forest that evening, going through his routine preparations. By the time the moon had risen and he had transformed, he was almost finished with his current book. He fumbled and struggled putting the bookmark in place with his clumsy, yet opposable, paw digits.

 

Gaara had taken the time to map out the safer areas in the Forbidden Forest so that he might avoid the dangerous spiders, overly affectionate thestrals, troublesome centaurs, and Fluffy. It had left him with two relatively clear areas, so he had taken the area further away from the castle, where Hagrid wasn’t likely to stumble across him.

 

Gaara had learned that climbing trees in this form was a fun challenge since the form clearly wasn’t designed to perform the task. He could dig holes easily enough, though he tended not to since it covered his paws in dirt, but scaling any sort of tree was a difficult task.

 

He was half way up a particularly flat oak trunk when he heard a dangerous and familiar growling. He turned his head but wasn’t able to turn it around far enough to see the werewolf, so he ended up bended it backwards and seeing the energetic wolf pacing about the clearing, looking right at the small creature trying to climb the tree.

 

He knew the werewolf didn’t pose any danger to him in this form, for whatever reason, but being around the wolf didn’t bring out a… palatable side of Gaara. He had time after their last encounter to lament his _playing_ with another person turned animal.

 

He knew his mind worked differently in this body, but he didn’t want to give in to the indignity. Not without a fight.

 

That said, when the wolf let out an impatient woof, Gaara dropped off of the tree and trotted over to the larger mammal. They promptly began a game of tag.

 

Over the course of the night, they played tag, hide & seek (which was harder since they could smell the other), play fighting, and they also just ran around the forest. They didn’t encounter any acromantulas, which was a shame because Gaara wanted to see his lunar friend savage one of them. They did, however, run afoul of a single centaur patrolling the edge of their territory (most likely specifically to keep out the werewolf).

 

The adolescent man-horse fired an arrow at the pair of them, which was enough to have Gaara running in the opposite direction. He saw the irony in the situation after his thoughts a couple of weeks ago when the two fully grown centaurs had brandished their bows at him.

 

The wolf looked ready to run at the centaur, heedless of the danger, but followed after Gaara as soon as the tanuki had darted away.

 

That was the most perilous of dramatic thing to happen during the night, making it one of the most peaceful ones Gaara had experiences since this whole mess had begun.

 

As the sky was lightening, Gaara had been waiting for the werewolf to run away and leave him to go and retrieve his clothes. As soon as he tried to leave, the wolf would follow, so he ended up following the were-creature around the general vicinity of his clothes for a while, growing more and more anxious that his transformation would take place before the other afflicted male.

 

He didn’t think his wolfish companion would be so affable when Gaara was in his human body. Though, if he had his sand nearby, it wouldn’t matter much anyway.

 

They stopped in a clearly only a hundred metres away from his own, when the wolf sat back and then started to howl. Unlike any of the happy howls or communicative ones Gaara had heard during the night, this was clearly one of agony, signalling his time to go.

 

He transformed just before he reached the area where he had hid his clothes, marking this as a particularly close call. He threw on his uniform quickly and ran back the way he had come as soon as his sand was on his back.

 

The werewolf was still mostly canine by the time he returned. Obviously werewolf transformations, unlike his own, did not get easier with time. By the looks of things, the transformations must have gotten worse over the years. It was painful to watch and worse to listen to, Gaara thought.

 

It certainly would make an interested conversation with Professor Lupin when he next saw him. The DADA teacher had likely never seen what Gaara was now witnessing.

 

Of course, in a matter of minutes, that thought was derailed as he saw the wolf’s snout snap back onto a comparably flat human face. A recognisable face, at that.

 

Gaara leaned against a tree, the shock actually taking its toll. Of all the people in the world, it just _had_ to be Remus.

 

If he habitually swore, Gaara would have then.

 

Instead, he mimed not so silently, “Typical.” Followed by a heavy cough, and an experimental “Ow.” His throat hurt a great deal, and he could feel his voice weakening the more he used it but it was working!

 

He wanted to test it even more, but as the feeling had indicated, his voice was fading as fast as it had returned as the next time he tried speaking it came out as nothing more than a croak. Still wonderfully audible, but not intelligible.

 

He didn’t have time to be dwelling on this encouraging trend as Lupin would not be much longer, so instead he waited a few more moments for Lupin to finish changing and to cover himself, before walking towards him.

 

No one would know the tanuki creature that roamed the grounds spent the rest of the month as a human, so Gaara didn’t need to worry about any association with it when he approached the visibly exhausted man.

 

The rustling of the leaves at his feet alerted the man to his presence, and he looked up, took a good long look at Gaara’s impassive face, and uttered an “Oh.”

 

His croaky voice and trembling knees were not an impressive sight, nor was his half naked body, covered in scars showing his ribs. Gaara knew his own was no pretty sight, so he pitied the man briefly, before darting forward and stopping him collapsing.

 

“How… how long have you been here?” Remus said, looking even more pathetic than when Gaara had carried his drunken body back to his office.

 

Gaara stared at him, thinking that Lupin’s absences and appearance around the full moon made a lot more sense now. He felt himself rather lucky in that regard as he was fully functional whereas Lupin would have likely taken the better part of an hour to put on his clothes, let alone the time it would take to return to the castle, which had to be at least three miles away.

 

Lupin squinted, looking at the sand as it formed words. The morning after the night before was clearly affecting him in every possible respect.

 

‘I saw you transform back from being a werewolf.’ He figured he would cut to the heart of the matter.

 

“Oh, right… well, then I think we will need to talk about this. But not until I am wearing substantially more clothes.”

 

While he wasn’t as friendly as drunk-Remus, post-werewolf-Remus was remarkably similar in a number of other regards. It was difficult to watch the grown man struggle so much to put on a shirt, doubly so with the added grunting and groaning he made.

 

When he was attired, Gaara helped him to stand and then to walk. It took only a hundred metres for Gaara to get frustrated by Lupin’s constant stumbling and noise-making and throw the full grown man onto his sand to carry him.

 

Regaining his bearings, Remus thanked Gaara for his harsh kindness, settling into the sand stretcher for the ride.

 

“As you will know from class, werewolves transmit their disease with a bite. What we didn’t cover was that these are not always random, animalistic attacks. My father said some… unkind things about werewolves in front of an evil man one day when I was a young boy. This terrible man was a proud werewolf named Fenrir Greyback who decided to teach my father a lesson by attacking me. He snuck into my room at night and before my father could drive him off, he bit me. I was five years old at the time.”

 

Lupin was drifting dangerously close to reminiscing, Gaara thought.

 

“Of course, there was no cure for it, so I have had to transform every month since I was five. When I got to school, for the first couple of years at least, Professor Dumbledore was the only one who knew about my condition.”

 

Gaara thought long and hard about the fact that Lupin had had to undergo such painful changes for so many years. Not to compare them, but Gaara found himself considering whether it would be less humiliating to turn into a wolf rather than a tiny tanuki. Sure, there was obviously pain, but he wouldn’t have to worry about being attacked (or beribboned), just worry about eating the occasional sheep or mauling villagers…

 

“Professor Dumbledore helped me a lot back then. He made sure I was able to transform safely away from everyone else. This was before the Wolfsbane Potion had been invented, you understand.”

 

Gaara wondered how Lupin would act, in his werewolf form, if he hadn’t taken the potion. Werewolves were apparently incredibly aggressive when untreated, even to their friends, family, or companionable tanuki they would otherwise like to play with.

 

‘Did you transform out here back then as well?’ Gaara asked.

 

“No, Professor Dumbledore was kind enough to provide me with a safe place to do it. I was too young to walk through the Dark Forest alone before and after the change, especially as it always leaves me so weak, so he used a little of the school’s funds to purchase a rundown property and then had a tunnel constructed to allow me to get there and back without anybody noticing.

 

“It was the Shrieking Shack that he got for me. I would go there and transform alone and then be back in the morning before anyone noticed I was missing. There used to be all sorts of wards on the Shack to stop me getting out, but they’ve all long since faded. I expect Dumbledore’s completely forgotten about the Shrieking Shack by now.”

 

‘There’s a tunnel?’ Gaara would have been indignant, having walked miles through the forest in the snow and the rain to visit Sirius, if he thought it might register with Lupin who was still in the throes of his lycanthropic hangover.

 

“Oh, yes. About that… I would have mentioned it earlier you see, but you tend to draw attention to yourself, and we couldn’t afford for anyone to notice you near the Whomping Willow. If they find out about the Shack, Sirius will have nowhere to go.”

 

Gaara sighed. It was by no means his speciality, that was true, but he was still a ninja. He could, if the need arose, sneak past some teenagers and untrained civilian adults. Sure, there was the need for secrecy, but on the other hand he still had _some_ pride left…

 

‘I am a trained warrior. I can sneak past anyone here.’

 

Lupin was sure Gaara was bragging, but there was no way to be sure when Gaara’s face refused to show the smallest smirk or upturned nose.

 

“Perhaps you’re right. At least you seem to draw less attention these days, so I don’t see any harm in telling you anymore. Under the Whomping Willow,”

 

‘The violent tree near Hagrid’s home?’

 

“Yes, the Whomping Willow is rather ill-tempered. The trick is to touch the knotted root at its base, that will open the passageway into the Shack. Sirius keeps watch of the front garden to make sure no one is coming, so be sure to give him a good scare when you next go and visit him.”

 

The weakened smile on Lupin’s face was lees endearing and more alarming. It didn’t come as that great a surprise that Remus was a werewolf; there were warning signs after all, that he had missed because of his own lunar issues. Still, knowing that his friend had been suffering for so long without respite was sad.

 

Lupin’s smile dropped suddenly off of his face when he realised he had missed a prime opportunity for mischief: he could have told Gaara to do all manner of humiliating things when he pressed the knot like flapping his arms or hopping in place or…

 

So many regrets.

 

“Why were you in the forest so early, Gaara?”

 

‘I have been in here all night. I was monitoring the dementors.’

 

“Yes, ‘monitoring.’ I’m sure. After what Hagrid has told me, I suspect you have been ‘monitoring’ the acromantulas as well.”

 

Gaara’s impassive face looked anywhere but at Lupin at that point.

 

‘Just a coincidence.’

 

He carried Lupin until they reached the tree line, before he helped Lupin to stand again and they both limped back up the hill and into the castle. There was nobody around this early in the morning so Gaara took him all the way up to the strung-out man’s office again.

 

While he had what amounted to superhuman strength and speed, his stamina was one of the worst in Sunagakure, a trait that he had been trying to train out of himself for months. By the time they got to the DADA classroom and adjoined office, Gaara was sweating and cursing the four founders for making a school with so many stairs.

 

He dumped Lupin, conscious this time, with no more care or gentleness than when he had (literally) dropped Lupin off after his drinks on Gaara’s birthday. The groans and grunt he got in response were all the thanks Gaara needed, so he left the pained man to recover a little before the day ahead.

 

He needed to change his own clothes before breakfast; he smelled like the forest, which sounded nice in theory, the smell of nature etcetera, but really he just smelled like moss and dirt.

 

As he walked down the familiar path to the dungeons, Gaara’s hand snuck up to rub at the scar on his neck, his fingers running across the smooth surface of the largest and deepest gouge in his throat. With his hand still between his hitai-ate and his neck, he tried again to speak, but all he got was a squeak before he felt something give.

 

What followed out his mouth were garbled and harsh whispers, incomprehensible even to his own ears, but they _were_ audible.

 

He didn’t miss a step but he did smile as he walked. His throat was healing during these full moon transformations, whether over the course of the night or during the changes themselves, he didn’t know. Still, at least Shukaku was finally making himself useful.

 

Or, what did his Konoha counterpart term the exchange of chakra for housing inside of a Jinchuriki? Ah yes, Shukaku was paying rent, at last. Absolute defence, notwithstanding.

 

That screaming, whining, irksome beast was due a visit sometime soon, he supposed. If only to confirm that this world’s peculiar effect on the seal had not changed it further.

 

Of course, Gaara didn’t let on to Draco that his throat was on the mend, for the usual reasons of pointless secrecy. That, and he didn’t want to draw any additional unnecessary attention towards himself. Madam Pomfrey had promised to not speak about any of his scars or other abnormalities, but he didn’t intend to make her privy to any more secrets than he had to, including his inexplicable (and slow) regeneration.

 

He needed to guard himself against overreliance on the people of this world.

 

At breakfast, clothed in a fresh uniform, Gaara watched with new eyes as Lupin struggled to his seat as he had every month since Gaara had known him. It made him feel a bit of a dunce now that he knew for sure, that Lupin had displayed these obvious signs all the while and Gaara had never put them together.

 

He took solace in the fact that no one else probably had either.

 

It was almost mesmerising, watching the man struggle to eat his cereal, his hands shaking most of the milk and shredded wheat off his spoon before it reached his mouth. He was broken from his reverie when he noticed Draco was staring at him, obviously wondering what Gaara’s fascination with their DADA professor was.

 

Not intending to give the game away, he wrote, ‘I believe Professor Trelawney has poured alcohol into her orange juice again.’

 

Draco looked to the head table, and predictably the Divinations professor was already looking drunk, which could have been because she was indeed sneaking drinks at breakfast or because she was still drunk from last night’s bender.

 

 OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Gaara hadn’t rushed to test his new path off of the school grounds, in part because he wanted to find a new area of research and that was taking up a an inordinate amount of his time, and part because he had had no luck in finding Pettigrew and it was a shameful defeat for a train professional like himself. That said, the opportunity for mischief Lupin had mentioned was too rich to pass up when Draco invited him out for a Hogsmeade visit.

 

It was always on Draco’s invitations that Gaara went to the nearby village since Gaara had no burning desire to be around people, because Gaara was entirely broke and occasionally he needed new stationary or other items only available through the generous charity of Lucius Malfoy’s second largest drain on his wallet. Draco was always happy to buy Gaara the things he needed since that amount didn’t account for even a tenth of Draco’s allowance, but Gaara normally had to drag his generous friend out of shops before he started buying useless items for him too.

 

What on earth would he need a cane for anyway? Even if it was imbued with lightweight charms and would be his size.

 

With the opportunity here, Gaara sent Draco on ahead with the permitted students whilst he waited for the coast to clear for him to take what he imagined would amount to a nice little shortcut, if Lupin was to be believed. He didn’t know if he would be angry or impressed if Lupin had managed to trick him during his sorry state that morning.

 

Sure, it would be quite the feat to make a joke when the man could barely stand, but then Gaara had to weigh that against the real danger his proximity to the great big, violent tree would place him in.

 

All that said, he was nervous approaching the willow tree’s base, eyes ever watchful for any sudden movements. With a great deal more luck than judgement, he made it to the prominent and presumptive special knot he was looking for. He wondered if his mysterious effect on the simple-minded creatures of this world, that the centaur had mentioned, had also ensured him safe passage past this surly tree.

 

Inside was nothing more extraordinary than a narrow, low-ceiling dirt tunnel largely maintained by the roots that occasionally hung down from the otherwise unsupported roof.

 

He stumbled along, barely having to lower his head in the low ceiling thanks to his unimpressive height, his hands feeling the walls in the dark. It must have been only a mile as soon after he felt a small incline begin, he was underneath a wooden trap door. He pushed up the wood slowly and quietly, immediately recognising the rotted downstairs hallways of the Shrieking Shack.

 

He used all of his considerable stealth skills to move upstairs, utilising his expertise to navigate the creaky floorboards (which were the majority) to get to the front bedroom. In there sat Sirius, watching the woods beyond the edge of the property intently.

 

Gaara walked up behind Sirius and waited.

 

It was five minutes of watching Sirius watch the outside before the man shifted a little and rolled his neck to ease the tension, inadvertently catching a glimpse of Gaara.

 

“Ahhh!” Sirius fell off of the bed he had been perched on, having turned almost as pale as Gaara himself.

 

Sirius stayed prone on the floor for a few moments to catch his breath, all the while staring up at the smirking red-head who had taken the time and the effort to sneak up on him.

 

“What – why – and the – how?” Sirius’ mind took a while to boot back up, before he finally sighed, smiled behind his thick convict’s beard and perked up.

 

“Nicely done!” He congratulated the prank well executed. “How on earth did you get in here? I barricaded all of the back entrances. Wait, you haven’t broken any of the walls down, have you?”

 

Gaara shook his head. ‘Moony told me about the secret passage under the violent tree.’

 

“He did, did he? Well, I hope he also didn’t suggest this little idea?”

 

Gaara shook his head very slowly.

 

“Right.” Sirius clearly didn’t believe it, but he could plan his revenge on the both of them later. He had all the time in the world, these days. “Well, it was about time he did. I wanted to tell you about it all along, but mister Moony-pants was concerned you would lead everyone and their mothers there.”

 

Gaara didn’t pout.

 

‘He told me after I saw him transform after the full moon.’

 

“Oh…” Sirius was wide-eyed, and entirely serious for the moment. “Well, that would do it. I suppose it’s good that you know, you know. That sort of secret can be hard to maintain, and a burden halved is a burden… wait, no. A burden shared is a burden halved. That’s it.”

 

Gaara nodded, he supposed it made sense.

 

What he had meant to be a short visit mostly for the sake of scaring Sirius lasted more than an hour, with Sirius falling back into nostalgic reminiscence as he was prone to do. He told of how he and James (and Peter) had discovered Remus’ closely guard secret and had undertaken their animagus training to join on those full moon without risking attack or infection.

 

As it turned out, werewolves could be trusted to play nice with their animal friends, even without the Wolfsbane Potion.

 

When Gaara did finally make his excuses (a nice description of what would usually be a tactful lie, not what Gaara had said: I’m leaving, you are boring me), he found Draco drinking butterbear in the Hogshead pub.

 

“I thought you said you were going to beat me here today? I’ve been waiting for half an hour.”

 

‘I got held up.’ He sat down and started sipping the drink Draco had ordered him while he waited.

 

It was actually the second such drink, the first he had ordered had sat there while he waited and finished his own drink, so he had ended up drinking Gaara’s and ordering another for his wayward friend.

 

That day, Harry had also snuck into Hogsmeade, using his Invisibility Cloak to follow Ron and Hermione through the village, and taking a good few minutes to quietly laugh to themselves at Draco Malfoy who had sat in the pub for twenty minutes on his own with a drink for a nonexistent friend.

 

Granted, their schadenfreude lasted only as long as Malfoy’s solitude did. After Gaara showed up, the trio quickly departed since they had a bad habit of being caught staring by Gaara and this time they wouldn’t have the entirety of the Great Hall of a professor to mitigate the awkward hostility.

 

The trip was uneventful for all involved, barring one sixth year girl who had had a fight with her boyfriend and had wandered to the edge of the village to cry alone. Thankfull McGonagall had sensed the shift in temperature immediately and had taken off running after the distraught girl.

 

Still, if the battle hardened woman had been even a minute late, she might not have been able to cast the patronus in time to save Andrea Bennet’s soul.

 

As a result, and with a heavy heart, Dumbledore announced the indefinite suspension of weekend Hogsmeade visits until such a time as they could ensure the students’ safety.

 

The proclamation over dinner had the expected effect, with almost every student third year and up loudly complaining about the decision. Amongst those not verbally abusing the kindly professor were a number of disinterested Ravenclaws, those like Harry who had not had their permission slips signed, Gaara for the previous two reasons and the other obvious cause for not shouting, and the friends of Miss Bennet, who had been called away from the girl’s hospital bedside for dinner.

 

Gaara wasn’t that upset about the restriction, being that he wasn’t allowed to go anyway, but this latest attack was yet more proof of the dementor threat. Even worse, Sirius had hinted at his increasing frenzy. The man was becoming impatient like never before, panicking that he would lose his chance over the summer, or the dementor patrols would catch him before then.

 

With those patrols moving closer to the edge of the Hogwarts boundary and further into Hogsmeade, it would only be a matter of time until they were regularly passing by the Shack. Sirius could hide as a dog for a limited time, but eventually they would catch him out.

 

Gaara decided that evening that he would forgo his research for the time being and focus entirely on finding Wormtail over the next couple of months.

 

If the rat was in the school, Gaara was going to find him.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

“He’s in your gourd?” Lupin asked, caught between amused and alarmed.

 

Gaara nodded, not proud of the part he was playing.

 

“You’ve done this before, though.”

 

Gaara nodded again. It was much easier this time, sneaking Sirius onto the grounds. The Shrieking Shack passage had made his visiting the agitated criminal many times easier, and then carrying him back into the school that many time simpler too. However, with the increase in turn out from politicians, families and the like, subsequent security increases, and the unprecedented number of student spectators, the stadium was filled to its magical capacity, and it was only by the grace of the kindly Professor Lupin that Gaara had been able to get in at all.

 

Sadly, he did not have ample space to set up a viewing box for Sirius and he again, instead Sirius would have to kneel or sit as a dog in the gourd and watch over Gaara’s shoulder.

 

It was the first time, in the crowded stands, that Gaara had ever gotten a truly dirty look for carrying his gourd with him. Apparently the other teenagers around him didn’t appreciate the oversized container pushing against them.

 

Gaara noticed that in the stands next to Dumbledore, Snape, McGonagall and Lucius was Minister Cornelius Fudge.

 

He actually asked himself if killing the bumbling politician would help Sirius’ or his own situation at all. The answer he came to was no, it would probably worsen at least Sirius’ situation, his being the likely prime suspect and all.

 

Still, a boy could dream…

 

Draco’s nerves had convinces Gaara that the blond should never hold a high-stress job since the boy fell to pieces when the expectations of those around him manifested openly. Another reason Gaara had been late picking Sirius up and thus late to the stadium was that he had to coax Draco out of their room and towards the changing room before the game.

 

He’d thought it before and he would do so again, Draco would make a terrible shinobi. Imagine if he were assigned to assassinate somebody…

 

Still, being as important a game as Gaara understood it to be, he hadn’t even bothered to bring a book for when he inevitably got bored of the sport, instead he would suffer the lengthy game in silence, and perhaps meditate with his eyes open in the middle. These games were the one time he prayed for the dementors to attack the children.

 

Just some purposeful excitement to interrupt the monotonous passing of the ball, flying around (on stupid and dangerous flying contraptions), and then so-called impressive acrobatic displays.

 

If they did these movements without the brooms, Gaara might have been impressed.

 

Gaara had been very firm with Sirius that the man/dog was not to howl, scream, cheer or make any noise (supportive or not) during the match, and that if he did Gaara would leave and take Sirius home. Sirius had been properly cowed, luckily, as it was a largely empty threat.

 

Gaara couldn’t possibly risk Draco noticing he’d left.

 

It bugged him that the Minister of Magic had brought with him a number of ‘Aurors’ to protect him, including a few Lupin had indicated were specialists from Azkaban.

 

Fudge didn’t care when it was just children and teachers out here, but when he might be at risk of a stray dementor or two, he brought an extra dozen wranglers for his own protection.

 

He was worse than the Daimyo.

 

Being as tense as they were, as soon as Hooch released the different balls and blew the whistle, every player on a broom flew into a frenzy, flying in rapid and aerobatic manoeuvres, trying to start with the upper hand.

 

Gaara watched only Draco as the blond finished his initial sweep of the stadium’s airspace, and settled high up, on the far side of the area to his father and the other VIPs. He looked panicked already, his head moving around rapidly. Gaara thought his friend was going to give himself whiplash.

 

The quaffle was passed around as energetically as it ever had been, goals being scored on either side within ten minutes of commencement.

 

All the while, Gaara’s eyes glazed over.

 

Inside of his mindscape, he headed down into the cave where he knew he could find his foul mouthed and tempered tenant stapled to the wall.

 

As expected, he found Shukaku on the wall, no longer screaming without respite, only occasionally yelling an expletive at his neglectful host.

 

“Well, look who we have here. The crown prince has descended to talk to us poor demons. What do I owe this pleasure to, oh tiny one?”

 

“I need to check if the seal has changed again.”

 

“Why, do you think it’s to do with your ugly, scratchy voice coming back?” The giant sand tanuki spoke with such glee and malice, Gaara knew he wouldn’t get a single straight answer out of the monster, no matter that the biju might know exactly what was happening.

 

The seal itself was exactly as it had been the last time he had bothered to bodily come down here. He hadn’t expected any different. Shukaku would have almost certainly alerted him to any changes, whether more comforting or painful, if they had taken place.

 

Gaara didn’t stay long in his mind, the company of his demon even less appealing than staring into the sky to watch his friend waste precious hours and energy chasing flying orbs around. He didn’t bother saying good bye to the ill-mannered tanuki, disappearing without warning to look out of his own eyes again.

 

Sure enough, the brooms were still flying and Gaara was stuck there. Every now and then there would be a sudden flurry of activity and the announcer would declare that one of the teams had scored another ten points (more often than not being Slytherin in this match).

 

He could feel Sirius banging on his gourd, obviously suppressing his cheers of angry exclamations whenever Gryffindor did anything, or one of the Slytherin players were less than gentlemanly.

 

That was one thing Gaara appreciated about Draco in these matches, he played by the same sportsmanlike rules and etiquette as his opponent. While doing that in battle was foolhardy and proud, doing so in a straight contest was honourable.

 

Or so he gathered from one of Rock Lee’s numerous impassioned speeches about his sensei.

 

With that in mind, it was a little painful to watch the obvious difference in natural athletic ability between Draco and Harry Potter. Or, more so, Potter’s eyes were clearly better at tracking the elusive snitch than Draco’s, whereas the Slytherin was probably a little more physically able. But in a game where their purpose was to track and catch a small, almost invisible flying sphere around a rather large area, Harry’s eyes had the edge on Draco’s minor athletic advantage.

 

The match was the longest Gaara had been to, and was in fact the most protracted of the year’s season, which made it feel immeasurably longer to the suffering teen amongst the throngs of cheering peers. He had taken to full meditation, staying out of his mindscape and going deeper to a dream-like state in order to escape the mind-numbing monotony of what others championed as the height of excitement.

 

He was only jostled out of his not-quite-thoughts when the people surrounding him had taken to jumping and screaming at the top of their lungs. Gaara would not have believed beforehand that they had been using anything but the full extent of their lung capacities.

 

Now back in reality, he looked around to see why the ruckus had escalated: the game was over and had been called. He was briefly confused as he was in the Slytherin section of the stands, and all around him were celebrating whereas the Gryffindors were looking much less enthused. This would have been self-explanatory were it not for the absolutely sullen look on Draco’s face that Gaara could see from dozens of metres away.

 

As it transpired, Slytherin had soared ahead in the points and had managed to accrue 230 compared to Gryffindor’s modest 70. Slytherin had the broom advantage still, and their beaters had been on top form, sabotaging many attempts at the lion’s scoring through the hoops.

 

It also helped that they had managed to disable their captain/keeper Oliver Wood and the chaser Alicia Spinnet. They substituted in for the positions, but obviously the team were weakened because of it.

 

With all of the point scoring going on, one-sidedly perhaps, the seekers had been entirely ignorant of all of it. The only measure of time the two boys had was their straining and cramping muscles as they went from staying still to sprinting at top speed to where they had caught glimpse of a flash of gold. A few times this ended up being a Gryffindor uniform to both of their ire.

 

Finally, Harry had spotted the Snitch closer to him than Draco, and his proximity and head start ensured that within second he had caught the Snitch, ended the match and elicited the mixed cheers from all around. The lions cheered their seeker’s ability and symbolic victory, while the snakes cheered for their victory. The particularly Quiddictch-obsessed among them had also worked out that Slytherin, as a consequence of their points in this and their other games, had just won the Quidditch Cup.

 

Gaara felt very sorry for Draco, whose team had just won the Cup no thanks to him. He would have to think of something nice to do for his friend, or at least something that would serve to distract the distraught teenager.

 

Speaking of distractions, he would need to start making his way through the crowds if he was to be there to intercept Lucius before he could spirit Draco away for a ‘private word.’ He didn’t need to see across the vast field to know what expression Lucius was liable to be wearing on his face at the present moment.

 

He was working against the dense mass of people, most of which were taller than him, who wanted to stay and cheer a little longer at their team. He eventually made his way through the forest of torsos until he finally met with a gap and was able to move behind the students to the exit. Once outside, he ran straight for the changing rooms, halfway around the stadium. By the time he was nearing it, the other children were starting to leave the stands and make their ways back inside or towards the changing rooms as well.

 

He stood guard outside of the door, more vigilant against his friend’s father than the nosey teenagers or one or two grown men with cameras. He been told, at length, the dangers of the press in this country (world) and the power of the camera. It had come up after he had almost attacked a short Gryffindor boy who had taken his picture.

 

He hadn’t known that his picture was being taken, only that someone had run up to him with as box in front of their face and then shined a bright light in his eyes. In retrospect, Gaara believed he had heard of cameras in his world, after a fashion, but he had never seen one nor had he been photographed by one.

 

He had never needed a shinobi ID since everyone in his own village knew precisely who he was and Suna hadn’t wanted to broadcast the face of their Jinchūriki (especially before the ill-fated war against Konoha.)

 

Still, now that he was watching these men wielding their cameras like overeager genin ordered to ambush an animal, he wondered whether he should not have dismissed Draco’s warnings about these ‘paparazzi’ offhand.

 

The bulbs started flashing as soon as Mr Malfoy strode around into view, followed by the perpetually red-faced Minister Fudge, and the handful of aurors guarding them. Gaara ducked into the changing rooms ahead of them, and looked around for Draco, who was the only one not smiling or getting changed.

 

By the way he hung his head in shame, Gaara wondered if Draco might have even worse self-esteem issues than some Jinchūriki...

 

With the approaching palaver, Gaara went straight to Draco’s side and then stared straight at both Fudge and Lucius when they entered, daring the latter to come near Draco.

 

Both the gentlemen offered their congratulations, along with Snape and Dumbledore who entered after who did likewise. The team were duly awed by the Minister of Magic visiting them personally after the game.

 

“Well, I must say that was one of the most exciting Quidditch matches I have seen outside of the professional circuit.” Fudge proclaimed, enunciating clearly for the man with the quill and pad of paper. “You have done your school and your country proud today.”

 

Dumbledore stayed well back, not wishing to upstage the politician with his own grandiose words of congratulation.

 

“I wish I could be there to present you with your trophy, but I am afraid running magical Britain must come first. Treasure your hard earned victory and rest ahead of next year; though, I expect I will see a number of you at the World Cup this summer. I’m sure any of you could be inspired to enter into professional Quidditch, if you do not have any more pressing ambitions.”

 

The Slytherin team were all exceptionally excited despite the hours they had been exerting themselves, and in the ruckus Gaara guided Draco over to the showers where he might freshen up and avoid his father. Gaara waited out in the changing room, but didn’t get any strange looks beyond the one from Fudge.

 

Lucius lingered after Fudge had left only a moment to see Draco was in the showers, and left looking contemptuous and frustrated. There would most definitely be a stern letter to follow.

 

It was the better part of an hour later that Draco was ready to go back to the castle and forgo dinner. They were almost upon the castle, not a word being spoke between them, that Gaara remembered he still had the most wanted man in Britain still trapped inside of his gourd. He gave serious thought to just keeping the mangy man in there for the time being, to keep him out of trouble and away from witnesses, but he wasn’t sure he could be trusted to look after a pet.

 

He would most likely forget to feed his captive.

 

He told Draco to go on to their room, and he darted back to the Whomping Willow to release the sweating, dehydrated, and disorientated convict.

 

When said convict glared at him, trying to catch his breath, the only thing Gaara could think to write was ‘Good game?’

 

That evening while the rest of their House were celebrating, Draco had elected to stay in his room, lamenting his failure.

 

Gaara had half-heartedly tried to argue that without Draco’s efforts, Potter would have caught the snitch too early and Slytherin would have lost the match and then their point count wouldn’t have been enough to secure the Cup.

 

“So I’m a stall tactic.” Draco was pretending to read a book, but unless he was trying to mimic Luna’s ability to read upside down, he was probably just trying to look nonchalant.

 

Gaara was actually reading, happy to stay out of the party raging amongst the other Slytherins.

 

‘His eyes are better than yours. It was a bad match up.’ Gaara wrote, thinking how else he could cheer Draco up without lying. ‘If you trained more, you might beat him next time.’

 

Draco’s eyes shot wide at that one word, “No, no, that’s okay. I don’t need any more training, I think. Potter’s just better than me. Perfect, popular, powerful, _Potter_.”

 

Gaara wanted to deny any of that, but other than the ‘perfect,’ they all had a ring of truth. Draco wasn’t deficient in any of those regards, but he was behind Potter in many aspects.

 

‘I didn’t know you wanted to be like Potter so much.’

 

“What?! I don’t want to be _like_ Potter. I want to be as far from like Potter as possible!” Draco declared.

 

‘Then you might want to focus on another sport. Or get better at Quidditch. And you are smarter than him.’ He didn’t need to hesitate in that compliment. Potter was a bit of a dunce, all things considered.

 

“So I might as well be a Ravenclaw.” Draco lamented.

 

Gaara thought back to times when he had been told about these sorts of tantrums. One particular tale came to mind, set in that small Wave country. Following his more upbeat blond friend’s example, he walked up to Draco, and punched him on the top of the head.

 

Not hard enough to knock him out, but Draco did yell and clutch his now aching skull.

 

“What the hell was that for?!”

 

‘Stop acting like a brat.’

 

 _He_ would have thought of something inspirational to say following the braining, but Gaara was still a student of social life, so he let his comment hang in the air (figuratively speaking).

 

“I’m not acting like a brat. Just leave me alone, for God’s sake!”

 

Gaara shook his head and sat back where he had been reading. He knew Draco was trapped here because he didn’t want to emerge into the party going on right outside their door and didn’t want to storm off into the bathroom like a crying teenage girl.

 

So instead he nursed the soft spot on the top of his head and mourned his ill fate.

 

The rest of the night was chilly to say the least, and Draco didn’t deign to speak again, so the two moved about in silence during their morning routines. Draco quickly headed out as soon as he was ready, clearly still upset about how Gaara had acted the day before. Gaara, for his part, was trying to figure out what he was supposed to have done differently.

 

Maybe he should have smiled at some point? Maybe shouting was required.

 

He skipped breakfast, missing the entire Slytherin table warmly welcoming their seeker who they trumpeted as their salvation, allowing them to rack up enough points to not only beat their rivals but take the Cup again. Draco avoided answering questions as to why he had skipped the party last night, and the ever-tactful House knew not to pry into one of their own and their bad moods.

 

Draco’s mood dipped even further after the morning post had been delivered and he had read through the short missive from his father threatening to have him pulled from the team if he didn’t do better next time. He would not allow a Malfoy to make a fool of himself.

 

At lunch, Gaara was feeling hungry, but wanted to stay away from Draco until he could figure out his next move. He was saved by the unlikely hero of Luna, who showed up carrying a basket and an offer of a picnic.

 

“Good afternoon, Gaara. Would you like some lunch?”

 

Gaara weighed up his options. He _was_ very hungry, but this course would require that he sit and eat with Luna, who was still taking every opportunity to discuss the form he so reviled. His stomach won out and he nodded, following as she strode out onto the sunny grounds. It was one of the warmest days he could remember having since he arrived in this world, so it was a pleasant enough day to eat in the otherwise unforgiving elements.

 

“I haven’t seen you in the Great Hall since dinner the night before last, so I thought you might be hungry.” She explained, forgoing a blanket and sitting straight on the dry grass.

 

Gaara nodded.

 

“You’re avoided Draco, aren’t you.”

 

Gaara nodded again.

 

“You’ve been avoiding me as well.”

 

Gaara thought for a second. He slowly nodded.

 

“I thought as much. People usually avoid me. Ginny does it every now and then, especially if she’s with her other friends. I think I embarrass her.” When Gaara looked up at her, she continued, “I don’t think you care what other people think. You just don’t like talking about yourself very much. That’s okay.”

 

For a person just wilfully admitting her only two friends both ditched her because they didn’t want to be seen with her or didn’t want to talk to her, Luna was remarkably unfazed.

 

“Have you thought about trying to learn how to become an animagus?” Luna said, taking out some plates and sandwiches, both of which Gaara quickly accepted.

 

He thought about what she had said before. She knew he had been avoiding her because of these conversations and yet that was the first thing she wanted to talk about. She was either mistakenly placed in Ravenclaw, or she was sticking to her convictions…

 

Impressive, and terribly frustrating.

 

Though, she did raise an interesting question.

 

‘Animagus?’

 

“Yes, so that you might control your transformations. I don’t know if it would work, and you would need to find a teacher willing to help you, but it might be worth trying. At least until you find a way to go home.

 

“Professor McGonagall is a cat animagus, but Professor Lupin could probably get you started since you know him best.”

 

Gaara thought about this. His best bet with a teacher would undoubtedly be Remus, but Sirius would be able to take him much further since he would be speaking from experience. Then again, the thought of Sirius as a teacher was enough to bring a wry smile to his face, briefly.

 

‘I’ll think about it. I am busy with another task at the moment.’

 

“Oh. Okay.” Anyone else would have been unable to let the matter rest, needing to know more about the vague statement, but true to strange form, Luna let the matter drop. “How fast can you run when you’ve transformed?”

 

Gaara heaved a great sigh. Maybe he should just give up and resign himself to these conversations. Eventually, even the bookend girl would run out of questions and thought regarding him other form. Right?

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

After the last class of the day let out, History of Magic which had gotten everyone ready for a relaxed, nap-filled evening, Gaara followed after a person he wouldn’t have ever thought to follow before. Weasley was the peculiar mix of hostile and dull that made him a very unappealing stalking candidate. Not that Gaara was following that particular person by choice.

 

His thinking was that eventually Wormtail would try to re-establish contact with the youngest Weasley boy, before the summer holidays came and the rat was stranded in the surrounded castle with no escape or protection.

 

This had led to the distasteful task of following the rat’s owner whenever possible, if not to catch the rat in the return then to ascertain exactly when Ron had reacquired his pet. Following him on the rare occasions that he was one his own was child’s play, but when the other two were with him it was actually something of a challenge in the long straight hallways of the castle.

 

Ron was comically oblivious, but Hermione and Potter were both far more aware of their surroundings. Still, he wasn’t a shinobi for nothing, so he made do.

 

Sadly, all of this meant nothing when Ron was still loudly complaining that his rat was missing, and that Hermione’s pet cat had probably eaten it.

 

The possibility would have made Gaara sick had Sirius not assured him that the half-kneazle was on their side.

 

During the evenings, Gaara patrolled the castle for the rat which was helped by the fact that the House Elves kept the castle pretty clean where Filch couldn’t get to, so any rats he was likely to find would either be another pet or the traitor himself.

 

Sadly he found no such traitors.

 

Spending hour upon hour hunting for rats in a giant medieval castle was nobody’s idea of fun, except perhaps one of the cats prowling around the place.


	12. A New Worry

With the schism between Gaara and Draco still ongoing, the pair went to considerable lengths to avoid being in proximity to one another. Admittedly, Gaara put a little more effort into this evasion, with his setting up a makeshift bedroom in one of the many abandoned classrooms he had previously stayed the night in.

 

Classes presented more of a problem, but Gaara had never had the most stellar attendance to begin with, and in those classes where he _had_ to go to, he sat in the back and Draco sat in the front.

 

Others had of course noticed this tumult, Draco and Gaara having fast become as closely linked in their peer’s minds as the Golden Trio. The only thing the Slytherin pair were missing were a catchy group name.

 

It alarmed almost everybody, this schism, because they had always counted on Draco’s cool, collected (and pureblooded) presence to control Gaara, who most still considered something of a bogeyman. In any case, it has resulted in Gaara returning to the absolute pariah he had been at the start of the year, and Draco being drawn closer to certain familiar social circles.

 

The blonde’s moderate friends were around him a lot more now too, no longer warded off by Gaara’s intimidating presence. And even some of his more tolerant purist acquaintances had allowed him back into the fold, though of course no longer as top dog.

 

More than the Slytherins who had been in much more contact with Gaara and knew that he didn’t actually eat first years (they were pretty sure…), the other Houses were staying clear of him in light of this current turmoil. If Gaara’s handler was absent, they didn’t want the violent and potentially dangerous transfer student anywhere near them, so they started to walk on the other side of the hallway or take another staircase if they could.

 

Amidst all of this, although unable to express it in any sort of helpful or constructive manner, Gaara did acutely feel the loss of his close friend’s company. Unfortunately, every time he was anywhere near Draco, that just seemed to anger the blond even more. He had tried thinking of things to say to him, but most of them still referred to the Malfoy heir as an idiot and involved him physically striking the melodramatic aristocrat.

 

In lieu of anything useful, Gaara spent the time he hadn’t reserved for searching the castle, revising for his upcoming exams. He made frequent trips to the Library to swap out books to read up on.

 

It had become a fun game, finding out what a Ravenclaw or Granger were reviewing and then check out all of the relevant books before they could. The looks on their faces when confronted by the bare shelves was almost a consolation for his other troubles, and it meant he could read the books himself without any gaps.

 

All this time, Draco was also suffering, of course. The funk from his Quidditch failure had passed quickly enough (it helped that mother had sent an owl following father’s, congratulating him on his team’s victory and reprimanding Lucius for his pride.) This had just left him with a hole in his life now, where Gaara had been. Gaara had a habit of taking up inordinate amounts of space in the lives of the people around him.

 

Lonely though he may be, Draco _was_ still angry about what Gaara had said to him, and secretly he was angry that they had fought in the first place and that he was left alone.

 

Gaara had decided, with term time running as short as it was, that he would forgo the helpful tutorials with Remus since both of their times could be better spent searching for the rat on those evenings. Of course, it hadn’t been easy for Lupin cutting Harry’s sessions short, but he agreed that they needed to find Peter before school broke up.

 

Harry had been very upset about the change, his Patronus charm still needing work, but Lupin had felt too guilty about cutting him off so he had agreed to teach Harry during his lunch breaks. For the sickly man, it was likely going to run him down very quickly, especially with the full moon again approaching, but he had never in his life been able to say no to those green eyes.

 

Of course, not only Gaara and Draco were stressing over the end of year exams. Hermione was spending on average more time in the Library than in her bed at night, and Luna was swiftly moving towards a new record for books read in a single week. She was something of a prodigious speed-reader when the book was the right way up, it turned out.

 

As two of the more dedicated students, no matter that they were in different years and Houses, Hermione and Luna had ended up sitting together in the Library on more than one occasion. It was always in a companionable silence since Hermione didn’t hold much respect for the flighty Ravenclaw, and Luna occasionally knew when not to speak.

 

This was how Gaara found the two of them, their tables straining under the weight of books they had piled high on top of it, one afternoon.

 

“Oh, hello Gaara.” Luna loudly said, looking directly at the red-head who had been walking quietly passed their table, a stack of his own books in his arms.

 

Having been spotted, Gaara straightened up, turned to her and nodded. Hermione peered round the stack completely obscuring her body and greeted him as well, “Hi Gaara. Are you revising as well?”

 

It might have been a stupid question had the odd boy not been visiting the Library all year, checking out all kinds of obscure and curious books.

 

Gaara nodded again; wondering if the conversation could be considered over and if he could politely depart.

 

“Why don’t you come sit with us? I’ve just been looking over my notes for Transfiguration and I would love to hear what you thought.” Hermione said.

 

He hadn’t interacted with anybody for at least four days and it wasn’t good for his stability to be isolated for so long. He nodded again and sat down in the empty chair, clearing a small space for his books. It wouldn’t be a protracted stay by any standard since his patience would only last so long, and he wasn’t sure the table would hold much longer under the combined weight of all of their books.

 

“How are you doing today, Gaara?” Luna piped up, not looking up from her current book. Judging by the title of that book alone, Gaara would have been surprised if the short blond girl didn’t come in at the top of her class.

 

‘I am well.’ Luna looked at the closed answer for a little longer before returning to her book.

 

Hermione was only too glad to find someone in her year willing to discuss their work with her. Harry and Ron were of course out of the question, much more interested in their sports and their games than their essential studies. And the Ravenclaws of their year didn’t care for Hermione very much, for some reason. It was almost as if they collectively found her personality off-putting or something…

 

The three pariahs happily read and worked together for a while before, ever-vigilant, Gaara noticed a certain someone had walked into the library.

 

Noticing Gaara’s gaze, Luna turned to see Draco shuffling into the room on his own. The boy looked at her and gave a half-hearted wave, either because he was still in the dumps or because he didn’t like her, before he turned back to his Slytherin friend.

 

Luna thought he might have looked away when he noticed Gaara was sat next to her, or some reaction at least, and then she realised Gaara had disappeared when no one was looking, and managed to take all of his books with him. Hermione jumped when she discovered the disappearance, but stifled any further reaction after she saw Draco continuing into the Library.

 

Later on, Hermione didn’t bother mentioning this latest mystery regarding their current favourite school-based curiosity to Ron or Harry. For one thing, they should have been focussing on their studies, not admittedly odd Slytherins, and also she didn’t want to ostracise Gaara any further by spreading gossip or talking about him like he was You-Know-Who.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

With Luna knowing his secret, and Gaara knowing Lupin’s, he had quite the choice at the end of May when the full moon was once again upon him. Still, his aversion to Luna’s obsessive interest in his tanuki-form was as strong as ever, so she wasn’t that much of a safeguard.

 

Since he didn’t have to worry about Draco, Gaara decided to transform in his new bedroom and then head out into the forest at his leisure. Dignified, it might not be, but ‘exercising’ with wolf-Lupin was the most interesting thing he could do in his animal body, so he decided to head straight to where the werewolf was likely to be prowling.

 

He had brought a lamb bone from the kitchens, with plenty of meat still clinging on, so that he could distract Lupin and run back to the castle when he wanted to. He’d go into the forest and stash it somewhere it wasn’t likely to be taken by a giant spider or a wandering thestral. If he took it with him, he would end up losing it to Lupin in moments. Werewolf noses were even better than tanuki ones, it seemed.

 

After he had shifted, he slung the bone across his back, wrapped in the material he had procured from an old flag in the Hogwarts trophy room. He walked brazenly out in the hallways, being in an abandoned area of the school where no one was likely to be.

 

On a completely unrelated note, Harry Potter had been out that evening, hidden safely under his father’s cloak, desperate for some alone time. Ron and/or Hermione had been relentlessly attentive recently, what with Sirius Black and his latest Quidditch failure. Both of those reason driving Harry instead to seek solace in his own company for a couple of hours. He had taken his chance when Hermione had forced Ron to start revising for Potions since his chances of passing the subject were only a little better than Neville’s.

 

With both of his best friends distracted, he had thrown on his cloak when they weren’t looking and left the tower. Still, he didn’t want Mrs Norris to smell him and alert Filch, nor did he want McGonagall or Snape hearing him, so he had headed to a hallway everyone knew had been abandoned for the better part of two decades.

 

At least it wasn’t a totally dark night, the moon shining through the windows pleasantly. His mind wandered back to his hunts for Gaara during the nights, impossible now that Lupin had confiscated the Map. His mind was called away from thinking about Gaara when he spotted a strange little animal padding around the corner. It was a little too small to be a dog, plus it had an enormous bushy tail, like a giant canine-squirrel.

 

Harry walked slowly towards it, to see what it was, when he caught sight of something slung across its back. It was carrying something in the middle of the night! His mind whirred through the possibilities, of which there weren’t that many, and he settled on the obvious conclusion that this animal was working with Sirius Black (as were most people and things Harry hated these days) and it was carrying a message from him, or was smuggling something into Hogwarts.

 

Gaara was rather enjoying the night air this evening. Summer was definitely on its way. He knew it would never be nearly as hot as his home in this country, but any increase in the temperature was a welcome change in the Scottish highlands. He was enjoying it right up until he heard the sound of steps tapping on the polished stone floors, coming towards him without an invisible source.

 

Gaara never like the Hogwarts ghosts, especially not when they came near him, but they had never been a threat to him. In the body he was in, his instincts were much stronger so when confronted by what he perceived to be a threat, of course, in his mind, there was only one thing to do, and that was run away. Out of the castle it could not follow him since ghosts were trapped in the places they haunted, as everybody knew.

 

His animal mind racing almost as fast as his animal body, Gaara reached entrance in minutes, having slid and skidded all over the place in his rush down through the castle. His inefficient sprinting had allowed his unseen pursuer to keep up with him, or at least keep him in sight.

 

After he had darted out of the threshold, Gaara paused, looking back, panting heavily. He was safe now, and had he been given a moment to collect himself he might have chosen a different strategy and run further out into the woods where he could lose whatever was following him. Instead, when he heard the sound of tapping on the floors turn to crunching and thumping when it ran out onto the grass and the dirt, he skirted around the invisible noise and ran back to the castle.

 

The next day, among his other troubles and thoughts, Gaara worried that this animal transformation situation might be getting worse and that his mind was delving further and further into the animal psyche each month.

 

For the night, though, his mind was firmly fixed on escaping his pursuer, whatever it was since it was almost certainly not a ghost. His analytical mind which would have pieced together the fact that ghosts float, they don’t run, in seconds, had finally worked it out with the help of whatever it was chasing him outside. Still, an invisible pursuer was certainly no safer than a ghost in his mind, so he didn’t stop to let it catch up.

 

He managed to duck into a classroom without the invisible thing seeing. It came with a great sense of satisfaction, the sound of footfalls passing by his hiding place. He stayed in the room as long as was able, but soon his instincts made him restless and sent him back out into the danger.

 

Sadly, the invisible assailant had been peering into the next room over, so he spotted Gaara as soon as he emerged through the doorway and followed after it immediately.

 

Harry was wary of simply grabbing the thing since it looked like it had some pretty sharp teeth and probably had some claws too, so he was trying to catch it from behind and use the absurdly large tail to block any rabid attempts to maul him. He might have used magic, but some animals (especially magical ones like what he suspected he was dealing with here) reacted negatively to different spells.

 

Hagrid was supposed to teach special stunners and restraining spells in seventh year, for use against magical creatures, but until then all Harry could do was transfigure his jumper into a length of rope and hope he didn’t catch magical-rabies.

 

That said, even if this thing could hear or smell him and was much faster, it was skidding about so much on the stone floor that Harry might eventually catch it. Not that he was having much luck so far…

 

He pursued it down the stairs into the Dungeons, an unpleasant area he was becoming quite familiar with in all of these chases.

 

Draco also had not been sleeping well, the combination of exam pressure and absent-Gaara stress, and so even though it was a school night he wasn’t asleep at midnight. Instead, he wanted to get out of his suddenly stifling room. The Slytherin common room was empty but too static and large for him. He wanted to wander around the empty Dungeons tonight.  

 

Snape wasn’t supposed to be patrolling that night, so Draco felt pretty sure he would be okay so long as he didn’t make too much noise walking around. Filch never patrolled the dungeons anyway.

 

As he opened the hidden door, he almost jumped out of his skin when a small animal ran right past his shins and into the common room. Spinning around and fumbling for his wand, Draco was surprised when the small… what was this thing? But it was standing on its hind legs thrusting one of its forepaws at the open entrance rather urgently.

 

Draco walked up to it slowly, expecting it to dart away from him as most unfamiliar animals would, but instead it watched him approach without any suspicion or alarm and then turned, still on its back paws and started walked towards the dorms.

 

Draco spotted the bundle slung across its back, so he guessed it might be a hidden pet, so he walked behind it feeling a little silly following this haughty creature like it was a person. He wondered who it might belong to in the boy’s dorm as they turned off from the girls (a relief because the enchanted stairs in Gryffindor sounded fun compared to the measures Salazar Slytherin had taken to keeping his hormonal snakes untangled).

 

The blond was downright suspicious when it stopped in front of his own door and reached above its head to turn the doorknob.

 

Wary that this thing might try to take something or be up to something, Draco watched it open the door and allowed it to pad in, walking right up to Gaara’s bed and jumping onto it.

 

“Wait, you can’t sleep there, that’s…” Draco’s sentence died in his throat when it performed an eerily reminiscent glare right at him, so similar to the bed’s absentee owner, and settled further into the covers. Swallowing, “Well, I don’t know who you belong to, but I don’t think Gaara is going to like his bed smelling of wet dog or whatever you are when he comes back.”

 

Gaara agreed, but he also knew that he smelled nothing like a wet dog and that he was pristine. Still, he didn’t appreciate the comparison and continued to glare at Draco. He also wasn’t happy about the probability that he would indeed need to change his sheets because it was summer and he appeared to be shedding a little.

 

Once again he was forced into an uncomfortable situation, but there was nothing to be done about it. He couldn’t let whoever had been after him outside catch him, so he had had to take refuge in his own House. And he didn’t like his chances among the other Slytherins so his only choice had been spending the rest of the night with Draco in their room.

 

The morning was sure to be eventful.

 

Draco was wary of the animal at first, waiting for it to go for him, but when the odd little fluff-ball moved the pillows and sheets into a loose sort of nest and laid down in it, he put down the book he was too tired to actually read and got ready for bed.

 

He didn’t sleep very well.

 

Draco blearily cleared his eyes and looked to the window, hoping to see some light filtering through the bottom of the lake. Nothing. He heard Gaara breathing across the room and slumped back in his bed until he remembered that Gaara was staying somewhere else at the moment!

 

He flew back up to look across the dark room, his mind wondering who exactly would have snuck into his room while he slept. His sleep addled mind took a few moments to recall that he had somehow invited a stray animal to sleep in Gaara’s bad late last night.

 

He breathed out slowly and wondered how he was going to get the beast to vacate the room in the morning. It was only five now, the sun wasn’t even up. Perhaps now was the time to kick the thing out, before the other students were awake. It would be kinder to escort it out of the school before everyone woke up and started to panic.

 

He stood up and turned on the light but that didn’t elicit any reaction. He’d hoped that would wake it up. Stepping closer, he reached to nudge its fluffy tail, currently wrapped around the little cannid, only to hear a low growl before his hand could make contact. After recovering from one hell of a flinch, Draco saw its eyes were open and looking directly at him.

 

“Um, sorry to wake you, but you need to leave now or else people will see you when you leave.” He felt silly for talking to a dumb animal, but that shame was quickly faded as the animal regarded him with a look that seemed to indicate it thought Draco was the dumb animal.

 

The animal failed to rise and pad over to the door, instead it ignored the noble pureblooded wizard and went back to sleep.

 

“Now, you look here, you’re either leaving now or when I go to class because I am absolutely not leaving you in here for Gaara to find when he sneaks in during the day. And I don’t want you chewing on the pillows or relieving yourself on the rug. So you have to leave!” Draco said more forcefully.

 

Gaara had enjoyed his doze until Draco had tried to get him to leave. It didn’t occur to the tired tanuki that the invisible being that had chased him in there had most likely moved on (or given up and gone to bed) and that he could still leave and change elsewhere, preserving his secret. Instead, he wanted to continue to sleep on his comfortable and familiar bed with his tail and pillows and sheets all gathered around him.

 

And then Draco _had_ to wake up and try and kick him out. He stared at his dumb roommate before giving up and going back to sleep. Draco would get frustrated and leave him alone soon enough. He could ignore him until then, Gaara thought.

 

Gaara immediately changed his mind when Draco made that spurious comment about him _relieving himself on the floor_. He spun around as soon as those words left Draco’s mouth and growled and yipped his indignation loudly.

 

Draco backed away from the irate animal and decided to leave it be for the time being. He’d try again after he’d showered. If he had to, he would lead it out with people watching. Hell, he’d drag it out by its oversized tail if he had to.

 

Sighing, he sat down at his desk and started writing more notes for his revision. His life seemed to revolve around revising at the moment. If people knew how seriously he was taking his studies he would never live it down, but he didn’t exactly have the same thriving social life he once had with which to otherwise fill his time.

 

It wasn’t long until Gaara felt himself change back into his human body and right mind. Once again, the dull ache in his throat returned, but considering the situation he felt it would be better if he didn’t spring his healing voice on his soon to be overwhelmed roommate too.

 

Still, he couldn’t stop himself from clearing his throat a little to ease the soreness.

 

Draco heard the oddly human sounding throat clearing and glanced back to make sure the sandy-coloured thing wasn’t retching on the bed or the floor. Instead, he found Gaara lying in bed like he’d been there all night.

 

Like he’d been there all night…

 

He’d been there all night…

 

Oh for God’s sake!

 

“Gaara, is it normal for people to turn into weird little animals where you come from?”

 

Gaara missed the rhetorical nature of the question and shook his head.

 

“If it’s not one thing it’s another. Can you turn back into it? I want a better look now that I know you won’t bite me. You’d better not bite me.”

 

Gaara shook his head, looking around for any sand he might have left behind in here since his gourd was back in his temporary bedroom. He managed to scrounge up a handful from under his bed that had to be spelled out right in front of Draco’s face to be legible.

 

‘It is involuntary. I change with the full moon.’

 

“Wait, so you’re a were- whatever that is? You better bloody well not bite me now!”

 

‘I wasn’t bitten. And the form is of a tanuki, a… magical creature from my world. I don’t know why I change.’

 

Draco was developing a headache, either from Gaara’s ridiculousness or from sleep deprivation.

 

It didn’t occur to either of the boys that whatever tension had been between them the past week or two had been instantly dissolved by this revelation. It was hard to hold a grudge against somebody when they spent the night as an harmless tanuki every month.

 

“So how long has this been happening?” Draco’s mind tried to recall a full moon where he had seen Gaara not transform. He was coming up blank, but he was remembering one or two incidents at the beginning of the year when he had suspiciously ‘fallen asleep’ early on the evening of full moons and woken up the next day with a bump on his head or a druggy after affect.

 

‘Since I came to this land.’

 

Draco’s mind was abuzz despite the early hour, but Gaara soon clammed up, declaring that he didn’t want to talk about it anymore. There was even a hint of a blush on his cheeks at all of the talk about his ridiculous tanuki transformation. It was bad enough Luna that knew, Draco was going to be even worse. For one, he was harder to get away from, sharing a room and all.

 

Draco turned away to let Gaara get dressed and then proceeded to ask more questions about the transformation: what did it feel like to change? Did he need to see the moon to change like a werewolf? What was a tanuki? Why was Gaara a tanuki of all things? Could he control sand in that form? How good was his hearing or smell? Did anyone else know? Why did he have such a large tail?

 

‘Why do they always ask about the tail?’ Gaara thought, outwardly ignoring the questions as he imagined he would increasingly have to do.

 

Later that morning, Gaara retrieved his discarded possessions and took them back to his room.  When he got there, Draco was staring at the bone Gaara had been carrying around on his back.

 

“A little snack?” Draco asked, sniggering.

 

Gaara considered his response, ‘Not for me. It was for the werewolf.’

 

Draco turned white, “You’re joking right?”

 

Gaara went back to ignoring him, content to let Draco wonder.

 

Gaara’s morning was quite busy after his secret had been revealed to Draco. He had run to find Lupin and helped him again, following the man’s more difficult transformation.

 

He found him at the edge of the forest, limping his way back to the castle as expected. He was very grateful for Gaara’s help with the stairs but kept insisting Gaara’s didn’t have to help him. He wasn’t very convincing when he couldn’t stand by himself.

 

Gaara ‘suggested’ that Lupin skip breakfast and try to recover some of his strength, which Lupin ‘agreed’ to. Gaara would let him out when his classes started.

 

The red-head had woken up from his nap rather hungry, so he didn’t skip breakfast that morning as he might have otherwise liked. To that end, he sat at the far end of the Slytherin table from Draco under the pretence that they were still fighting. Gaara had just said he was sitting elsewhere, it was Draco that had said how smart the ruse was.

 

As had become the custom, Harry was telling his friends about what he had been doing all night while they were sleeping.

 

“It was about half my height, but it had this really long tail that was as big as it was.” Harry said, pouring himself an extra serving of cereal, trying to combat the fatigue he knew would abate with the right amount of sugar. “It smelled me I think, so whenever I was about to catch it, it ran away.”

 

“So let me get this straight, Harry, you stayed up almost the entire night so you could chase some pour cat around the castle?” Hermione exclaimed.

 

“No, Hermione, you’re not listening. It wasn’t a cat, it was some weird dog or something. I haven’t got any idea what it was, but it wasn’t a Hogwarts approved pet, that’s for sure.” Harry fought back. His heavily ringed eyes and jerky movements didn’t speak to his credibility.

 

“Never heard of anything like that around here, mate.” Ron chipped in between mouthfuls.

 

“It was Sirius Black’s, I’m telling you!” He heatedly whispered. “It was carrying something on its back, like a message or a cursed object.”

 

“So why didn’t it give you the cursed whatever?” Ron asked.

 

“Okay, so maybe it wasn’t a cursed item, but it was definitely carrying something, and I doubt it was a midnight edition of the Prophet.”

 

“You know what it could have been? It could have been an animagus. Professor Lupin’s taught us all about them. Maybe Black’s an animagus and he was sneaking around the castle himself last night.” Ron said.

 

“Honestly Ron, that’s just silly. Animagi have to register with the Ministry, and I’m sure they would have released a press statement if _Sirius Black_ could turn into an animal. Also, being an animagus is an incredibly rare talent, only a handful of witches or wizards have learned how to do it in the last century. And lastly, don’t you think the Ministry would have thought of it, if Sirius Black’s method of escape had been so simple.”

 

Ron shrunk in his chair a bit, too intimidated to try and defend his theory. “I suppose you’re right.”

 

“I don’t think Sirius Black would have run away if it had been him. He probably would have attacked me, or he might have recognised my father’s cloak and known it was me.”

 

“So, why were you out there, again?”

 

“Oh, I was, um, looking for Scabbers. Summer holiday’s coming and I thought I might be able to catch him if he couldn’t see me coming.” Harry said, not wanting his friends to know how stressed he was feeling these days.

 

Ron was perfectly pleased with the answer. “Oh, thanks, mate.”

 

Hermione might have spotted the lie if she weren’t working on another conspiracy at the moment. Another breakfast where Professor Lupin had failed to attend. He had either missed or shown up sick to every breakfast following a full moon since term began. She was 96% sure of what he was.

 

It might have been higher but for Gaara throwing her judgement into doubt. She had harboured a similar suspicion about him, with his penchant for missing breakfasts and dinners around that time of the month, but he had showed up to enough that it was very unlikely he was a Lycanthrope.

 

Not that it mattered much either way, other than the obvious safety concerns. She certainly wasn’t prejudiced and didn’t buy into that preposterous notion that all werewolves were _dark_ creatures who were animals, liable to savagely attack anyone around them at any given time.  Granted, she wouldn’t approach one on the night of the full moon, but any other day she would try to offer the benefit of the doubt.

 

It was after breakfast, with ten minutes before he had to walk to his first class of the day, that Draco wondered why Gaara and he were pretending to still be fighting. It had seemed like a smart idea when Gaara suggested it, but now Draco realised he had been tricked.

 

Easily.

 

Before any resentment could bubble back up, he felt a tap on his shoulder and looked around to find Luna Lovegood of all people staring at him.

 

“Good morning. I’m glad you and Gaara have sorted out your problems. He’s looking much happier today.” She said. Draco stood up and walked out of the Hall, hearing her short-heeled shoes tapping after him.

 

Draco looked over to where Gaara was still sitting, and he couldn’t tell if Gaara was happy, sad or confused. He had an excellent poker face. The blond certainly couldn’t discern any upturn in his demeanour. If anything Gaara looked dour this morning.

 

“You might be right.” Draco said noncommittally.

 

“Of course, he usually looks happier the mornings after.” Luna continued.

 

“Wait, by morning after…”

 

“His transformations.” Luna said it like Draco had simply forgotten the word.

 

“You know about those?”

 

“Yes, I found out a few months ago. I take it you learned about it last night?”

 

“How did you know I knew?”

 

“Well, you made up last night didn’t you? It’s written all over Gaara’s face.” Again, he snuck a glance and still couldn’t tell if Gaara was really conscious or if he was sleeping with his eyes open at the table. His face was totally blank to his eyes.

 

Luna could apparently see a number of things that nobody else could, so it wasn’t outside the realm of possibility that she could also discern Gaara’s facial expression when no one else was able.

 

Draco’s wonderment aside, he soon picked up on that one fact, “Wait, so Gaara let you in on his secret months ago and I only found out last night?”

 

“Well, I wouldn’t say he let me in on his secret. It was more like I discovered it on my own.”

 

“I remember those posters you made with the sketches now. They looked just like him when he was…” He trailed off rather than risk exposing the truth to any eavesdroppers. It’d be bad enough if anyone knew he was talking to a second year Ravenclaw girl, he didn’t need them hearing their (apparently shared) secrets too.

 

They walked together away from the Great Hall and Draco wondered if Luna’s first class was near his own or if she hadn’t noticed they were walking.

 

Along the way, they both discussed Gaara’s fluffy-form to their hearts content as they had been unable to do with the only other person who knew the secret. Luna was very excitable when it came to Gaara’s transformations, whereas Draco was more curious as to why his friend transformed in the first place. There were a number of oddities surrounding the red head, and they were starting to bug him.

 

It was like there was some huge part of the mystery he was missing that would help him make sense of the foreigner.

 

The pair also came to the same conclusion: it was strange that everyone still feared Gaara despite his saving everyone on the Quidditch pitch from dementors months ago and had toned down his aggressive and misanthropic tendencies too. If the school could see him during a full moon they would definitely change their minds about him, that was for sure.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

As the month rolled into June, the last of the school year, a new worry etched itself into Draco’s mind: where was Gaara staying during the break. The thought had of course occurred to him before then, but now it was becoming a pressing matter. He wasn’t sure if he could invite Gaara to stay at the Malfoy estate for the full summer after he had stayed for Christmas, either. And he didn’t know if he could ask Gaara to come to his home again without inadvertently making his parents responsible for him by default.

 

With Gaara’s temperament and behaviour, that was quite the burden to thrust upon his mother and father.

 

He was also terribly afraid to ask his father for permission to bring Gaara home again because it would necessitate a frank discussion between his father and he regarding Gaara. Both of his parents had been willing to indulge his friendship so far without any gains to be seen from it, but that would only last so long as they were willing to turn a blind eye.

 

They had taken Gaara at his word that he was from a suitable pureblood family, and forgiven his lack of proper manners as being a foreigner. Eventually they would want to know exactly who and where he had come from.

 

For that matter, Draco wouldn’t mind knowing as well.

 

Dumbledore had his own plans for Gaara this summer. The boy had landed in his lap entirely unexpectedly, but Albus was nothing if not adept at adapting to changing circumstances. He would never have guessed young Sirius would somehow escape from Azkaban but the rest of what followed had sadly been quite predictable.

 

Gaara was a strange child, one of the strangest he had ever met, but knowing the boy now as he thought he did, he wasn’t all that difficult to understand and anticipate.

 

He would have liked to leave Gaara in Remus’ care over the break, seeing how close they had become over the course of the year. It was a curious bond, but one born from shared hardship and experiences, he thought. However, the law was the law and Lupin couldn’t look after a child being what he was. It was only because none of the parents knew about him, that Remus was allowed to teach in the school. And it was chiefly because of the regard the Ministry still held Albus in that they had listened to his request and kept Remus’ secret to themselves.

 

The Ministry were already curious about the boy, so there was no way they would continue to stay quiet if Lupin tried taking him in. Severus was out of the question for both the obvious reasons and because of his record. Hagrid had a record too, sadly, and Albus thought it would be a real hardship for his friend to try and look after a teenager.

 

The Wealseys would have been a good choice, but they had so many mouths to feed already, and Gaara did need a little more attention that they could reasonably be expected to provide. Plus, there was every chance Harry would be staying with them by the end of the summer too, so the Burrow was out.

 

He was far too busy (and old) to do it himself and Minerva was similarly busy and unsuited.

 

He had worked through his entire address book (tearfully crossing out a few old names since the last time he had looked through it) trying to find a suitable guardian. He needed someone he could trust to look after the boy, otherwise he would presumably be left in the Malfoys’ hands for the whole summer. He had been wary enough of the Christmas visit, but too long around those sorts of people might reverse the good work Gaara had done on Draco.

 

From the dwindling list of Order members still alive and capable, he had ended up with two names: Emmeline and Sturgis. He had asked both without divulging too much information (not because he didn’t trust them, but because it was a lot to ask) and Sturgis had outright refused. A little guilt applied here and there and Emmeline reluctantly agreed.

 

It would be a good set up as the Ministry would have little recourse since she was a respected witch of impeccable character who wouldn’t be overburdened by the job (probably).

 

He didn’t want to upset Gaara by telling him too early, but on the other hand he didn’t want to wait and risk losing the boy to the Malfoys. He had decided he would tell him after his exams had finished, with the two week respite before they went home for the break.

 

Difficult and at times tear jerking, by and large the job of finding Gaara a home had actually been something of a fun task for the Headmaster, a distraction from the darker issues he was facing at the moment.

 

Unbeknownst to the bearded man, Remus had already planned to invite Gaara to stay with him at the end of the year. He knew the Ministry wouldn’t like it, but he would ask Dumbledore to intercede on his behalf. It might cost a little political capital, but he was sure Dumbledore could manage it.

 

Sirius had never been much of a forward thinker, so his plans really just revolved around catching Peter and how that would solve all of their problems. He would take custody of Harry and take in Gaara too, he could help support Lupin as well. Then he usually devolved into imagining his peaceful life together with his friends and ‘family.’

 

All the while, Gaara figured he would just hang out in the Forrest for a couple of months and go into town to get supplies every now and then. Spend some time with Fluffy and maybe Sirius if he wasn’t bugging him too much. Keep an eye out for the rat if he didn’t leave the school with Weasley.

 

And, needless to say, the Ministry had plans too.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Draco walked through the corridor with a book open, safe in the knowledge that almost nobody else would be taking this route to get the Astronomy Tower. Gaara had said he would meet him outside of the Abandoned Tower before they went to their Astronomy exam that evening. He didn’t bother asking why Gaara was meeting him there or what business his roommate had in that particular tower, he had too much to think about as it was.

 

Gaara was waiting there conspicuously as expected so Draco finished checking one last fact before storing the book in his satchel and continuing along. As the first of the exams, it held a special place in Draco’s contempt but it was certainly not the most worrisome test he was soon going to be taking. Astronomy happened to be one of his stronger subjects since he had been introduced to all of the major constellations when he was just a child, whenever his mother would talk about her family history.

 

As they ascended the spiral staircase with their classmates to take their tests and perform the practical Astronomical observations, Draco once again worried about Gaara’s grades. Astronomy wasn’t his worst subject, and he clearly did study a lot, but he was so far behind their year when he arrived…

 

Gaara on the other hand was worried about Draco’s stress levels. He seemed to be worrying about a lot at the moment. He was probably…What was that word again? Neurotic.

 

Gaara had gone to see a psychiatrist shortly after the Konoha-Suna conflict after his sister had asked him (and made sure he wasn’t going to kill the man for talking to him). He hadn’t really been analysed because he had just asked lots of questions of the understandably nervous therapist and left when he was finished. Suna decided to declare him fit for duty despite the failed attempt at gauging his state of mind.

 

They had used him before, and he _was_ improving so it was decided he was ‘safe’ to return to active duty along with his siblings.

 

Yes, Draco was definitely neurotic, but he didn’t bother mentioning this helpful piece of psychological wisdom to his friend since it was both a muggle science and from another world. Who knew which sciences had progressed here? He still couldn’t believe some of their machines.

 

But then, he also couldn’t believe some of their prejudices in this world. Advanced in some areas and primitive in others.

 

That entire week was filled with exam after exam for every student in the school. The career students, primarily in Ravenclaw, treated it like a religious holiday and would hardly say a word to anyone the entire time from their first exam to the last.

 

And after every test, the students would run over their answers in their heads and try to figure out where they went wrong so they could panic for the next month or two until their results were released. Those lucky enough to be in close-knit friendships would experience a mutual concern over each other’s performances. Although, for a certain pair of Slytherins, it was a little one-sided.

 

What little emotional investment Gaara could muster for these useless tests, he trusted in Draco’s ability to pass all of his classes. He was bright, powerful enough, and had been studying more than anyone else in their House for the past month, except perhaps Gaara.

 

Draco wasn’t so confident in Gaara’s grades. Granted, the improvement the foreigner had undergone since September was immense, he hadn’t even blown anything up during his practical demonstrations for a while. That alone spoke volumes. Draco told himself that the exams had all gone smoothly, so Gaara couldn’t have done that bad. He had even shown up to their Potions finals, to everyone’s collective surprise.

 

Snape looked about ready to call the whole thing off when Gaara stepped back into his laboratory for the first time in months.

 

By the time last test had come and gone, the school was feeling the annual strain fall from their shoulders. There was another two weeks before the train would come to take them home but it was paid little heed that weekend as most treated their work as finished for the summer.

 

To celebrate and reward Draco for his hard work, Gaara gave him a large bag of Honyduke’s sweets.

 

Since the cancellation of Hogsmeade trips, luxuries like sweets and the like had become precious commodities to the imprisoned student body. The fact that Gaara had broken the embargo didn’t raise as much as an eyebrow when those told were confronted by the sight of the bulging bag of tooth-rotting goodness.

 

Even Draco didn’t bother asking where or how Gaara had gotten hold of the loot. The students were allowed a small amount of sweets through the post, and those with enough money could buy these kinds of items from the enterprising Weasley Twins. Rumour had it that the pair were still able to get out into the village, but most dismissed this as a myth.

 

If it were that easy to sneak in and out of the school grounds, Sirius Black would have murdered Harry Potter by now.

 

The Weasley Twins were expensive and Gaara was entirely too poor to have afforded a bag this large, and no one was sending him candy, so Draco would have been left to wonder if he weren’t suddenly so popular amongst the gluttons of his House.

 

And the envy of the gluttons in other Houses.

 

Once again the Weasley Twins, hearing about the impressive procurement, wondered whether Gaara was trying to compete with them again.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

After the exams had passed and the classes had moved onto the next years syllabi for every class (except the seventh years who were almost universally lazing about the castle), Gaara was called to Dumbledore’s office for a short meeting. He went without any delay since he hadn’t been called to see the old man in a while and to his knowledge he hadn’t done anything wrong lately.

 

Unless his practical scores had that bad…

 

He waved off Draco’s concern and walked there on his own, skipping the next class and going straight to the concealed spiral staircase instead. It was only Care of Magical Creatures anyway. Draco would tell Professor Hagrid where he was and he probably wouldn’t even be marked absent. The half-giant was an agreeable teacher that way.

 

On his way, he had passed by a number of departing students who were exerting very little effort to conceal their rampant, round-the-clock partying. Most of the eighteen year olds he was passing by were either recovering from last night’s hangover or working their way to tomorrows.

 

It was quite refreshing to be around an adult atmosphere again, shame it wasn’t a mature one.

 

He knocked on the sturdy wooden door and was beckoned in immediately. Evidently the old man had expected him to come straight away and cut class. He was learning.

 

“Good morning Gaara.” He said, taking a sip of his tea. “Or, rather, good afternoon. Tea?”

 

Gaara nodded, knowing the man kept his tea set stocked with some of the more palatable tea blends he had been forced to endure in this world.

 

Gaara nodded again after the elderly teacher handed him the cup, and Albus replied, “You’re welcome.”

 

“Now, you are probably wondering why I have invited you here this morning.” He started, offering a biscuit for courtesy’s sake. “You do not have any living relatives in this country and cannot return to your home over the summer, as I understand it. Is this correct?” 

 

Gaara paused for a few seconds but nodded.

 

“Normally your case, unusual though it is, would be left to the Ministry to handle. However, that would be… difficult to navigate. The Ministry is overburdened so I have elected to act in my role of custodian of Hogwarts’ students and find you a suitable place to stay until school reconvenes in September.”

 

Gaara didn’t like where this way going. It was bad enough Draco was losing sleep over the letter he had been trying to write for the last four days, addressed to his parents and most likely concerning Gaara’s living situation. He knew people saw him as a child in this world, but was there really a need for all of this controlling behaviour?

 

‘Where?’ He didn’t care for the infantilisation, but if he was going to be put somewhere suitable for the months off anyway, he didn’t want to fight it out of principle. Plus it might ease Draco’s put-upon shoulders.

 

“An old colleague of mine has agreed to take you in as a favour to me. Her name is Emmeline Vance, she used to be an Auror for the Ministry but now she is a professional duellist. One of the finest spellcasters I have even seen, I would say. She has the skill of a witch twice her age.”

 

Gaara mulled this over in his head. She would certainly he helpful in his learning wizardry, but on the other hand he didn’t like the sound of her doing it as a favour. Dumbledore was involving himself in Gaara’s life just a little too much. Plus, he got the distinct impression his movements would be heavily restricted if he were to agree to this.

 

‘No, thank you.’ Gaara stated simply.

 

“I’m sorry, my boy, I don’t quite follow.”

 

‘No, I will not be staying with Miss Vance over the summer.’ Gaara didn’t add anything else, readying himself to leave and skip the rest of the current lesson.

 

“No, my boy, I’m afraid you don’t quite fully understand the situation. We cannot release you at the end of term without a suitable home for you. Now, Emmeline is a lovely woman, I’m sure you two will get on swimmingly.”

 

‘You cannot release me? I am not a prisoner.’

 

“No, of course you’re not a prisoner, but every school has a duty of care to their students. Hogwarts is no different.”

 

‘I will find myself suitable accommodation until September. Thank you.’ With that, Gaara stood to leave but Dumbledore quickly waved him back to his seat.

 

“No, that won’t do. You aren’t old enough to make that decision yet. If you have another suggestion, I could perhaps look into it, but otherwise I have to hand you over to Miss Vance.”

 

‘I am not from this country. I am an adult in my own.’

 

“I am sorry to say that the laws of this country are what govern here, and in them you are still a child.”

 

Gaara might have liked to argue how he hadn’t been a child since he was knee-high. When he had taken his first life and been told he was a monster who had killed his own mother…

 

He might have liked to argue the point, but it would serve little purpose here when all they regarded were ages when determining adulthood. No sense in needlessly disclosing the more sordid parts of his personal history.

 

Still, he would now need to come up with an ‘acceptable’ living situation for the summer since he could guess the Headmaster wouldn’t go for his plan to camp in the woods for three months. He would have gone straight to Remus with this problem, but the way Werewolves were treated in this world, he didn’t see much point.

 

As far as Gaara’s could see, Remus was only employed by the grace of Professor Dumbledore. There was no way the Headmaster wouldn’t have suggested the most involved teacher in the school unless there was a reason for it.

 

The Malfoys?

 

No.

 

He didn’t know any other (legally free) adults. He would need to give it some thought, or else he might just escape. The mass of children and lack of supervision had allowed Gaara to transform every month without anyone noticing (with two annoying exceptions.) With a single adult keeping an eye on him, a close eye if his suspicions about Dumbledore’s motives were correct, he would be in grave danger if he went where he was supposed to.

 

The conversation had lapsed, the only sound being the sipping of tea. When he had finished his, Gaara set it down, nodded his thanks, and left without a word.

 

Albus let him go and continued thinking on his plans. Gaara had been surprisingly obstinate about his independence. He had played his hand, it was up to Gaara now. He couldn’t actually stop Gaara if the boy didn’t want to go to stay with Emmeline, but he hoped his guidance would be heeded.

 

If Gaara struck out on his own this summer when the eyes of the Ministry were still firmly set on him, it would only lead to disaster. He could protect Gaara, but only if the boy didn’t sabotage his efforts.

 

He wondered what was actually worse, Gaara on his own when the Ministry had their unhealthy interest in him, or spending the summer with the Malfoy family. It was testament to his own prejudices or rather grudges that this question had come up in his mind. The Malfoy’s had done nothing but help Gaara since making his acquaintance. He had nothing nice to say about Lucius, but as a unit they had not moved to harm the boy so far.

 

Anticipating a fight with Gaara over his future, he started planning ahead for his meeting at the Ministry in under a week’s time, on the twenty-third. The meeting was a strategy meeting between a number of interested and relevant people to discuss the ongoing Black Crisis.

 

In attendance would be himself, Minister Fudge, Morbidus, Lucius, Minerva, Fillius, the head dementor wrangler currently stationed at Hogwarts, as well as Rufus Scrimgeour, Amelia Bones, and the Head of Magical Punishment, AKA the man in charge of Azkaban and every dementor under the Ministry’s purview.

 

In all, it was set to be a positively excruciating meeting, but with any luck he might have them remove at least some of the dementors from the school next year. Then again, he was arguing against those who were calling for the school to close until the problem had passed, so it would not be an easy discussion.

 

He would tell all of the remaining staff members to be on high alert that night in case Sirius somehow caught wind of their departures. It would most likely be fine though.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

The night of the summit was a big night to be sure. Lupin was preparing for his final transformation of the school year, as was Gaara. For the former it would mark the end of his being expected to show up to breakfast in the morning, he could return to spending the day or two following his changes recovering in bed.

 

The latter, Gaara, was anxious over his soon to be changing venue because depending on where he ended up he was going to have a lot more difficulty changing in peace. Even if he did stay with Draco, which was not looking too likely considering the letter was still on Draco’s desk, and Draco helped conceal his changes, the manor had servants and two very interested parents.

 

Harry’s afternoon hadn’t been in preparation as much as recovering from the shocking experience he had at the end of his latest Divination lesson. Professor Trelawney had been pleasantly predictable for the majority of the year, ‘foreseeing’ a number of students’ deaths and generally failing to convince anybody that she could see anything, least of all the future.

 

The only exception before today had been the first time she had taught Gaara, where she had performed a very different act in predicting Gaara’s future. The strange voice, ambiguous content and memory loss afterwards were a departure from any of the other insights she had felt compelled to share in every other lesson since.

 

She had been very interested in her ‘prophecy’ directly after the event, but the day after whenever anybody mentioned it she clammed up and pretended it never happened.

 

That afternoon, Harry had heard another which had him honestly scared. Trelawney had foreseen the return of Voldemort, who would rise to be even worse than he had been during his first reign, and it would all be triggered by some chained servant escaping.

 

His first thoughts were that Sirius Black was involved, but he had no idea what Trelawney had meant by the ‘break free’ tonight part. Surely Black had already escaped, that was the whole problem.

 

He had, after finding that his professor was ignorant of her actions, tried to go and tell Dumbledore since he seemed like the man to tell. When no one was there to let him up into the office, he tried to go and find McGonagall but she was missing too. His next stop was Professor Flitwick, but it looked like all of the senior teachers were missing tonight.

 

Afraid that these things might be connected, he went back to tell his friends. On his rush back to Gryffindor Tower, he considered what he knew about Black. The friendship and betrayal of his parents, family history of blood-purity and dark magic, imprisonment after killing Peter Pettigrew, twelve years in Azkaban before being the first person to escape, and then he had headed to Hogwarts and broken in.

 

The twelve years in Azkaban bit definitely corresponded to the prophecy, if it was actually to be believed, but otherwise it wasn’t a whole lot of use. There were other things and theories he recalled, the most recent of which would be the strange animal he had been chasing last month.

 

It had showed up on the full moon, which wasn’t just linked to werewolves but a number of other magical creatures and wizarding rituals, according to his Astronomy text books. It might have been a coincidence, but if it was working for Black, and it was linked to the lunar cycle, then it would be appearing again tonight.

 

He told all of this to Ron and Hermione and they were both quite shocked. Even Hermione, sceptical about all things Trelawney, had to admit it was a peculiar confluence of events and was worth investigating. She had been quick to quash Harry’s notion of looking for Professor Lupin that evening to help, arguing that he would almost certainly have gone with the other missing professors.

 

Elsewhere, Gaara had changed in his room for the first time in months and had quite enjoyed how relaxed it was without the worry of discovery. Draco had been fascinated by the transformation itself and had started to talk to Gaara excitedly about it before realising that his mute friend couldn’t even use sand to reply now.

 

“So it’s true, you change with the setting sun rather than the presence of the moon like werewolves. That must mean you spend more of the night changed, don’t you? Although, I suppose that would vary with clouds and the rise and fall of the moon…Can you even understand a word I’m saying?” He said, looking down his nose at the animal his friend had turned into.

 

Gaara disregarded the question and went back to his bed to read for a little while. He couldn’t leave his room until the common room was deserted. Snape would show up at around nine or ten and ‘persuade’ them to go back to their rooms in a persuasive style quite reminiscent of Gaara’s own. Until then, Draco would be freaked out by the unsettling sight of his roommate reading cross-legged on his bed like always, but inside the body of a ‘tanuki.’

 

Gaara had the same plan as last month, complete with treat to get rid of Lupin when he was done ‘playing.’ Sadly, as he learned about seventy seconds after he left the Slytherin entrance, so did Potter, Granger and Weasley. Of course, he didn’t register that it was the same sound and thus same pursuer as last month plus two helpers, instead he went back into the primal mindset and took off running away again.

 

Draco had been planning on lounging about for the evening, maybe read a little or catch up with his moderate friends since his purist ones had once again drifted away from him when his friendship with Gaara was repaired. Instead, shortly after he had let Gaara out into the Dungeons, he heard the scratching of a four-legged animal scrambling for purchase with its claws as it frantically tried to run away from something. A scant couple of seconds later and he heard a group in shoes run past after.

 

His breath caught in his throat and he too started running, going to the exit and out after the chase he had heard to try and protect Gaara from whoever was chasing him.

 

He couldn’t help the “Bloody typical!” that slipped out of his mouth as he spotted (who else but) Potter and his cronies chasing after Gaara at the one time of the month the psychotic red-head was incapable of fighting back.

 

With no other course of action, Draco started off after his peers, unsure of what he would say if he caught up. He supposed it would depend entirely on how much the Gryffindors knew. If they knew it was Gaara, he would probably be fighting to stop Gaara killing the three when the sun rose.

 

Then again, why fight against a good thing?

 

If Gaara had just accepted Draco’s offer to help during the full moon, to stick by him and keep an eye on him. Instead, he said he was going to go and ‘fight a werewolf’ or something like that. Ridiculous. And now Draco was running around in the middle of the night, trying to protect Gaara who by all rights was the one that should be doing the protecting in their relationship.

 

Gaara had glanced back a few times to check if his pursuers were still on his proverbial tail, which sadly cost him the few seconds lead his faster running had built up since the last time he checked. By the time he had reached the exit into the open air, they were still only twenty feet behind him and didn’t look like they were ready to give up any time soon, except for Ron who was beginning to look a little winded.

 

And Ron had been having such a great afternoon, too…

 

Gaara, looking back one last time as he ran down the hill, swerving away from coming into the attack radius of the Whomping Willow, saw that not only were the three Gryffindors still after him, but so was someone just now exiting the castle who looked an awful lot like Draco.

 

Still, out in the open like this, especially downhill, Gaara had doubled his lead in seconds and was practically at the forest line, in which he would be able to escape without any trouble, when he heard a scream.

 

Turning around, he expected to see Granger being attacked by the malicious tree, instead he saw that the girlish scream had come from Weasley who was being dragged towards said tree by a dog he was sickeningly familiar with.

 

The remaining two thirds of the Golden Trio tried to give chase but the Willow had obviously just woken up after having its knot touched, and so started to attack the two teenagers with extreme prejudice.

 

Gaara dearly wanted to go after Sirius, find out what he was playing at, or at least stop those two idiotic lions from getting themselves killed by the local flora, but in the form he was, he could barely help himself. There was nothing he could do but watch them struggle and risk their lives.

 

When Draco, who had given that scene a wide birth, reached him by the tree line, he watched too. And he was even more clueless than Gaara as to what was going on.

 

“You didn’t know that was going to happen, right?” Draco asked, switching his terrified gaze from where Potter and Granger had crawled under the flailing tree, to Gaara whose eyes, unchanged from their intense human versions, were staring at the unfolded scene too.

 

Draco might have heard a whine come from his canine friend, but he didn’t say anything.

 

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Omake:

 

The third year was different for a number of reasons, like the start of trips to Hogsmeade village, the moderately relaxed curfew, or the introduction of elective classes. However, the change that Remus was concentrating on, quite hard in fact, was the change in Defence Against the Dark Arts exam procedure. The first two years involved a basic demonstration of spells learned over the course of the year.

 

The third year was the first that the students were expected to cast their spells at a living target: their professor. Now, for most this present nothing more than an inadequate practice for his shield charms, but there were two exceptions.

 

There was Harry, who was at least two years advanced in his spellcasting, and thus had a much stronger spelt that took Lupin quite by surprise after having lazily cast the ‘Protego’ charm for the dozen children before him. Still, he had survived war before becoming a teacher, so stopping the unexpectedly potent disarming hex was nothing more than a jolt to wake him up.

 

It was pure luck that that adrenaline came in time to ready himself for Gaara whose turn came soon after.

 

Gaara was no longer the uncontrolled explosive force he had been at the beginning of the year, but he was still unbelievably powerful for his age (or in general). Lupin had seen the boy demolish training dummies, designed to be resistant to magic, using a simple tickling hex.

 

When Gaara had sidled up to him with his wand drawn, Lupin actually felt sweat form on his brow. Gaara gave him a moment to summon up his shield before he raised his wand and prepared what should have been an entirely harmless spell. The reason the professor in these exams was to shield himself was that it was a test of potency rather than technique. It was in the fourth year that such spells would be fired at the examiner with the intent of actually disarming.

 

It was for that reason that Remus felt relief, since he didn’t know if he could have survived if he weren’t allowed any protection.

 

Gaara pulled his wand up and then without a word levelled it at Gaara, sending out an alarmingly bright flare towards him.

 

It flew quickly and impacted his shield hard enough to have him bracing his wand with both arms. Fortunately it had been a quick spell, otherwise he would have needed to cast a more powerful protection.

 

Gaara passed that portion with flying colours, by some miracle, since the point of the exam had indeed been to ensure the students had the requisite raw power to progress to finer technical specifics.

 

Lupin considered Gaara’s chances and hoped the curse of the DADA professorship took him long before he had to start tutoring the boy for _that_ exam. 

 

Heaven forefend.

 

After Gaara left the testing room, he met Draco who looked altogether too concerned, and Gaara just wrote ‘I passed.’

 

Draco couldn’t believe it, but just told himself it was one less subject Gaara would fail in.


	13. A New Conclusion

“Please, come this way, the Minister is expecting you.” The secretary led the esteemed group towards the Ministry Meeting Room, knowing full well that Cornelius was still sitting in his office so he could keep them all waiting at least five minutes to establish who was most important.

 

The large and estimable group included Albus Dumbledore, Minerva McGonagall and Fillius Flitwick from Hogwarts, all of whom had taught most of Britain’s Witches and Wizards since the mid-1950’s. The secretary himself had been a member of Professor Flitwick’s House, and struggled now not to show an improper amount of respect to someone who was not his boss. The Minister had emphasised that while they may have been his teachers once upon a time, now they were just private citizens and he was a _Ministry employee_.

 

He didn’t bother to try and correct his boss, that Dumbledore was not a private citizen but the Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot and the Supreme Mugwump. He had seen at least two secretaries and another Ministry worker lose their jobs for correcting the Minister in the four years he had worked for the man. He was already the most senior among the man’s secretarial squad.

 

Then, behind the teachers, came Lucius Malfoy, purposefully walking apart from the others. His cane tapped against the floor in a hypnotising fashion, but the twenty-four year old administrator’s thoughts were quickly drawn from the aristocratic blond when he remembered the other man walking along down the corridor: Henrik Morbidus.

 

As much of a grown man as he was, he was still frightened of Morbidus. Honestly, he had very little idea of what the man did for the Minister, only that he had unfettered access to him and everyone knew you didn’t cross him lightly. The more gossipy of the Ministry staff spoke in hushed tones of people being threatened or disappearing.

 

He didn’t believe all of that but the gaunt, insectoid man still terrified him.

 

Trailing at the back came the four other Ministry employees: Marcus Barnett, Head of the Department of Magical Punishment and Sentencing; Derek Sutherland, the head dementor wrangler from Hogwarts; Rufus Scrimgeour, Head Auror; and Amelia Bones, Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement.

 

Such a distinguished group, feigning civility.

 

Scrimgeour and Bones got on well enough, but no one liked Barnett since his job was essentially the management of dementors and Azkaban, a job that no virtuous man would consider undertaking; and Barnett was quite suited to his ill-reputed position, as far as anyone could see. Then there was the dementor wrangler who looked ready to fall asleep if he stood still for any length of time.

 

If there was any report needed about the state of Hogwarts’ security or the presence of dementors at the school, it was the state of abject exhaustion the head of the dementor wranglers was in.

 

The group walked without a word to the meeting room that few living had been to before. A Minister for Magic in the seventeenth-century, whose name the lowly secretary couldn’t recall, had commissioned this Meeting Room in the lowest bowels of the Ministry as his office at the time. He had been a terribly paranoid and had ordered a number of powerful wards and protections be enacted around it to stop him being killed when the Ministry was breached.

 

No such breach ever happened and after two more Ministers had been isolated in the dark office, they had elected to move their work space in the Ministry proper, and the old office became the Meeting Room for covert or important meetings.

 

No one was sure why the Minister had ordered the meeting be held in such a secure, remote and seldom-used location. Most who knew about it figured it was a shallow display of the seriousness of the situation.

 

In other words, it didn’t matter to Cornelius whether or not it helped fix the situation as long as he was seen to be acting; or, that was the secretary’s understanding, at least.

 

He led them all into the room and was then to stand outside of the room until Fudge arrived so that he could seal the doors. The Ministry Meeting Room was built to withstand attack, but now it was simply the most undisturbed place in the country.

 

Hearing hurried footfalls behind them, he turned and saw a Ministry regular running towards the group. Gerald Goyle ran as fast as his bulky frame would allow until he was next to Malfoy. After a whispered word or two between them, Lucius stopped walking to address the man properly, albeit with a rather conspicuous eye-roll.

 

No one heard what was being said, but Goyle kept glancing towards the Meeting Room and then started gesturing towards it, all while Lucius sneered and shook his head, replying in the same bored, inaudible tone. In under two minutes, Lucius turned about face and walked away, contemptuously ignoring the Goyle’s look of shock at his dismissal.

 

Lucius didn’t bother to look back and walked straight into the room. Gerald stood there looking dumbstruck for a moment before turning around and leaving the way he came.

 

All of the invitees took their assigned seating and settled in for the predictable wait for Fudge, who had made a reputation for himself for keeping people waiting for no discernible reason.

 

“I don’t believe I have seen this room since May of ’45. It appears to have been decorated.” Dumbledore mused, settling into his seat for the long haul.

 

“Wonderful.” Lucius drawled, anticipating any number of useless titbits over the coming meeting.

 

For an unpunctual man, Cornelius was quite precise in exactly how late he was going to be. He showed up no more than twenty-seconds after the five minutes mark, bustling into the room.

 

“I am terribly sorry for keeping you all waiting. Busy times, as I’m sure you can understand.” No one bothered to reply, which took the wind out of his self-important sails a little bit. “Now, let us begin…”

 

What followed was the beginning of the single longest meeting Albus Dumbledore could remember ever being part of. He had sat through war councils that lasted days, but the sixteen hours they sat taking attendance, noting people who couldn’t make it, discussing points of discussion, organising sub-groups, explaining seating arrangements…

 

It was as if someone had devised a Cuciatus variant that simulated the uttermost extremes of tedium, without the possibility of relief since the room was sealed against interruptions. By the sixth hour, a majority were wishing for another Goblin Revolt to lay siege and try and break down the doors.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Peter Pettigrew knew Remus had the Map; which had made his presence in the castle too much of a liability these past months. The only times he had been able to sneak back in and catch up on the latest wizarding news had been on the full moon when he knew for certain Remus wouldn’t be in the castle or looking at the Map.

 

Fortunately, the part of him that might have felt guilt for exploiting his old friend’s condition like this had died a long time ago. It had to make room for the larger areas of self-loathing in his brain.

 

That said, he had also snuck into the school during the day a few times when he knew Lupin was teaching and thus unlikely to be able to check the Map. It was dangerous, but he had spent twelve years as a rodent to stay abreast of his native culture’s current affairs and be ready for his Lord’s return.

 

It was this attention to his surroundings that had yielded an interesting result: the meeting between the most senior staff at Hogwarts and a number of Ministry officials on the night of the full moon, the last such lunar event before the students all left for the holidays.

 

If he could just get back to the Burrow with the youngest male Weasley, he could somehow orchestrate Lupin’s sacking from the school and he would be safe next year. The Ministry would undoubtedly have dealt with that Gaara child by then, and Sirius was on borrowed time as it was.

 

Once the children had cleared out, they would let the dementors swarm the entire area, he suspected, and even an animagus wouldn’t be safe with that many wraiths around them, so while Sirius was doomed, Peter had to make good his escape.

 

It would have been simple, but there was a four day gap between the full moon and the students’ return to their homes, so he would be forced to do yet another evil to his past and his friends. He would have to destroy the Marauders Map that the four of them had spent countless weeks and months working on together.

 

His attempt to enter the castle covertly that evening didn’t go to plan as, of all people, Ron Weasley had spotted him like an owl hunting small animals, and had scooped him up with a celebratory cry. While he most certainly wasn’t a real animal, and he was using the Weasley family for cover, Peter couldn’t help but feel warmth at the happiness his retrieval had brought the boy.

 

Whilst he knew he would never be in any sort of position to demand such a thing; if the Dark Lord ever presented him with the choice of killing the blood-traitor family or sparing them, he would almost certainly spare them. Unless it was a test, in which case he would have no choice but to kill them all.

 

But still, the thought was there…

 

Unplanned, but not the end of the world. He would wait until Ronald took him upstairs, and then sneak away again and he would be that much closer to the DADA classroom and Lupin’s chambers.

 

What he had underestimated was Ron’s newfound determination to (heed his mother’s strongly worded letters and) keep a better hold of his pet. When they got to the right floor, he had tried crawling out of Ron’s pocket and had been taken in hand from that point and no amount of squirming or wriggling had released him. He would have bitten the boy, but that would likely have gotten him put straight into his cage.

 

He was taken to the Gryffindor dorms to meet the bookish girl again, followed by another almost-fight between Ron and her over that evil half-kneazle’s pursuit of him. It looked like he was going to be able to sneak away soon since these two couldn’t go more than an hour without fighting when they were alone together, but then James’ son arrived and he calmed them both down.

 

And then he heard the most valuable or rather most enjoyable morsel of information he had garnered in the last decade: there was a prophecy that insured the Dark Lord’s imminent return, and he got the impression he was the one that was going to do it! Tonight, he would escape from these people and go and find the Dark Lord!

 

Then they started talking about some sort of small animal and he was lost to the conversation. Sirius must have somehow found a way to train an animal to do his bidding. It was absurd enough to be Sirius’ plan. Just like the time…

 

No, he couldn’t bring up those memories.

 

He wasn’t very happy when he was carried back down to the bottom of the castle. Lupin would transform soon and he would need to start moving up there if he wanted to arrive shortly after Remus left. He needed to sneak in as the man left otherwise the office would be warded against intrusion from even the smallest animal.

 

Instead, he was being taken to where James’ son had seen a ‘giant-squirrel’ last month.

 

What followed for the rat was a nauseating series of jostling turns as he was thrown about in Ron’s pocket while the boy and his friend’s chased after the animal they had correctly located. Then they ran outside.

 

This was ridiculous. He was _this_ close to chewing his way to freedom and hoping he managed to get all the way to Remus’ chamber before the man left for the evening. And then, when Ron and he were running past the familiar tree he had never personally needed to avoid before, he spotted Padfoot.

 

Sadly, he only saw the giant black dog as it was mid-leap at the ginger he was being carried by. He scrambled to get out of the pocket but Ron’s fall sent him to the bottom of the pocket and then he was trapped under the boy’s weight as they were both dragged under the Willow and to Peter’s certain doom.

 

He could hear Padfoot’s growling as he pulled Ron by the arm. After they went under the tree, he felt Ron fall a little and heard him scream bloody murder having broken his leg or his ankle.

 

Somehow, as they were dragged further and further down the dark tunnel towards the Shack, Peter thought he might not get around to destroying the Map tonight.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

The staffing shortage in the school caused by Fudge’s latest vanity project had meant that Remus was severely delayed that evening. He usually tried to get out of the castle and into the woods at least two hours before his change just to be sure.

 

With cloud cover and the rise and fall of the moon changing every month, he would never normally risk turning early and exposing the children or his colleagues to any sort of risk.

 

Sadly, with two Heads of House out, as well as the Headmaster, it fell to Lupin to not only attend dinner that evening, but also go on patrol even though Dumbledore had always ensured the schedules didn’t call on Remus before a full moon. But, with the ‘danger’ of Sirius Black being as imminent as it ever had been, all teachers were needed to patrol.

 

By the time he got back to his chambers, he was already out of breath from his impending change and from having run through the last stretch of his assigned patrol route. He rushed through his office and into the back room where he lived and pulled out the vial of Wolfsbane Potion Snape had given him with a smirk the day before. The last free potion Remus would be getting.

 

He set the vial down for a moment and checked the Map as he did whenever he had a free moment lately. He didn’t have a free moment right now, mind you, but Pettigrew had been on his mind almost constantly in the final weeks of the term.

 

…Pettigrew, and Gaara, who he was still waiting to hear back about from Professor Dumbledore.

 

Opening the Map, he scanned through each page representing each floor. One thing he noticed very quickly was that one of the few people he would know to look for in Gryffindor Tower was missing along with his two best friends. Working his way down, he then found a few very familiar names on their way out of the castle.

 

For some reason, and he couldn’t begin to guess the circumstances, Harry, Ron and Hermione were chasing after Gaara, and Draco was following them all as well. They had run out of the castle and were headed towards the very edge of the Map, which thankfully had been drawn to include the Whomping Willow.

 

It was this inclusion that allowed him to spy the most worrying part of all of this. With Ron’s name came Peter Pettigrew’s, and then Sirius Black showed up.

 

If there was any group of seven people he didn’t want meeting up unexpectedly, it was those seven. Sure, he was glad Sirius was closing in on the rat, but when he saw the footprints move impossibly fast towards Ronald, he knew Padfoot was the one in charge and would be liable to cause more trouble than he solved, as a dog.

 

He didn’t think twice, he dropped the Map and went running after them all. The last he had seen, Ron was under the tree and would be on his way to the Shack, and Harry and Hermione had just started towards the Willow.

 

Gaara and Draco had disappeared off into the Forest so he wouldn’t have to deal with them too, at least.

 

His mind was so busy with how he was going to deal with this that he didn’t even consider the potion he had left on the side, nor the Map he had failed to deactivate on his personal desk. His mind was firmly set to task: find Wormtail who was hiding from someone who wanted to kill him, protect a Potter who was put at risk by Sirius’ insanity, stop Sirius from doing something stupid. All before his ‘furry little problem’ was upon him. It was his fifth year all over again…

 

When he got outside and saw the Willow was fighting fit, he risked a glance skyward and saw that the clouds were still thick so the late moonrise would take even longer to affect him. He might be okay.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Harry and Hermione had both watched their close friend as he was tackled by the great big black dog, shocked into stillness. It was only as the redhead was being dragged into a tunnel under Britain’s most unfriendly tree and they heard his agonised scream that they thought to pursue him.

 

After they had run to the tunnel, remembered which tree they were standing under, and managed to escape from that tree with no broken bones, they quickly stumbled along the tunnel after Ron and the dog. Their wands lit the way but they had no clue as to where they were going nor how long it would take, and they didn’t want to stumble out into the danger unexpectedly, so they went more slowly than they might have liked.

 

Harry wanted to rush ahead, but fortunately Hermione was in front of him and had insisted on proper caution. Of course, that didn’t mean she didn’t want to rush in as well, but logic didn’t abandon her like it seemed to for other Gryffindors.

 

For instance, unlike Harry, she noticed the distance they had shuffled would have taken them out of Hogwarts already, and the tunnel had curved downwards and then up again, so they were likely going to be surfacing soon above ground.  Sadly, with her other commitments, she had never found the time to study the local geography as much as she would like, so she had no idea where they were going to end up.

 

They saw some very faint natural light filtering through the roof twenty metres away, so they doused their wand-lights and tip-toed onwards. Harry pushed forwards and started to lift the trap door the extremely dim light was shining through.

 

Up, out of the tunnel, they were in a derelict wooden house that neither recognised at first glance. It was rotted and damp, and the only light seemed to be the starlight filtering in through the windows that still, unaccountably, had glass in the frames.

 

Now with a little ambient light, the pair could see the blood stains on the floor where their friend had been dragged by the bloody great big dog. Neither believed it was the Grim that Ronald had compared it to, but they had their wands out ready all the same. Even non-magical wild dogs were incredibly dangerous, as evidenced by their absent, bleeding friend.

 

After a couple of seconds, they didn’t need the blood to know where Ron was as they could hear his wailing upstairs. They climbed the creaking stairs, thankful for the house’s cacophony of sounds that drowned out their movements. Something about the place was nagging at the back of Hermione’s mind. It was only when they were on the landing and they could clearly hear Ron’s caterwauling that she pieced together the two pieces of information.

 

The sound of Ron’s shrieking and the house that would be better described as a shack.  She was about to whisper this information in Harry’s ear but he was determinedly moving on to where his best friend was.

 

In what might have once been the master bedroom sat Ron, clutching his arm and with one legs stretched straight out because he couldn’t move it.

 

Ron didn’t have the look of relief on his face that they had expected when they came to his rescue. Instead, he whimpered and said, “It’s a trap!”

 

Harry spun around immediately and Sirius Black was stood there in all of his glory, which was more figurative than literal since he looked like a starved homeless man, dressed in rags, sported a dirty beard, and had what many would describe in the weeks and months to come as ‘the crazy eyes.’

 

Harry and Hermione backed up into the room, against the wall Ron was still slumped against.

 

“Where’s the dog?” Harry asked, not sure what else he could ask in that situation. He had spent so long thinking about what he would do when he confronted Sirius Black, but now it was happening and he was dumbfounded.

 

“He’s an animagus. I told you he was one!” Ron said accusingly, and Hermione dared to peak back at him, feeling a mite cowed. She wasn’t wrong that often, but she could admit when it happened.

 

 “He must have used that animal to lure you out of the castle, Harry!” Hermione whispered.

 

“I did not lure you here this evening.” Sirius rasped. “Still, when fortune shines down on you, it’s rude to ignore it.” He smiled and they had to endure the sight of teeth twelve years after a toothbrush had last seen them.

 

“You’re not taking him!” Hermione screamed, trying to position herself between Harry and Black, while Harry did the same with her. The ultimate effect was of two teenagers falling over each other while not breaking eye contact with their quarry.

 

“I’m afraid there is no escaping this. This is long overdue…” Sirius said as he took a step forward.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Draco watched Gaara as he tried to draw something in the dirt with a stick, but with the failing light and Gaara’s lacklustre artistic skills, it was a lost cause. It was a few minutes after they had watched the Golden Trio disappear into the ground that Gaara had started trying to communicate with his roommate with no result.

 

At first the small fluffy creature had tried growling and making strange yipping noises, but that clearly wasn’t going to work so he had tried drawing something on the ground that could have been a cloud, or possibly a picture of the castle. After a minute more of this, causing the small and arguably adorable Gaara to lose his patience and start getting worked up, Draco just said, “Why don’t you write it out instead?”

 

Gaara looked up at him and stared for a few seconds.

 

Obviously he hadn’t thought of that in his panic. This body played havoc with his good sense.

 

He started writing, ‘Go and get my clothes and my gourd. I will need them as soon as the sun rises.’

 

“How am I supposed to carry your gourd?! It has to weigh at least three-hundred kilos!”

 

Gaara stared again for a moment before writing one word: ‘Magic.’ He even included the full stop.

 

Draco didn’t want to go when there was obviously trouble afoot. Any time those three Gryffindorks were out and about at night, it usually resulted in a new DADA teacher and some spectacular rumours spreading around the school. Plus, Gaara clearly needed help as he was and Draco was loathe to leave him like this…

 

Oh, God… He was turning into a Hufflepuff!

 

No wonder his parents warned against friendships. Here he was volunteering to selflessly help someone whilst risking his own health…

 

Damn.

 

Draco took off running at his modest speed back up the hill to the castle, hoping he wouldn’t be spotted be one of the patrolling teachers.

 

He got the impression Gaara had a reason for not wanting the teachers to get involved, though he couldn’t fathom what it might be. Still, it would have been interesting if Professor Snape _had_ found and stopped him to ask what was going on. The summation of what he had seen would have caused the pale man to showcase all kinds of interesting and amusing emotions.

 

Gaara watched Draco climb the hill for as long as he could before he got embarrassed by the spectacle of the boy struggle to jog up the incline. Physical Education needed to be a higher priority in this world. No more than sixty seconds after Draco, visibly wheezing from a distance, had entered the gate, Lupin of all people ran out and straight towards the Whomping Willow.

 

Gaara didn’t know how Remus had found out about all of this, but he was glad there was someone he could count on with more sense that Sirius.

 

 _More_ sense, but not a lot. Why the man was running in there at all when the moon would be rising fully anytime now was a mystery. Gaara tried running up to the Willow to head Remus off and get him safely away, but the man had already disappeared under the roots by the time he was halfway there.

 

Gaara sighed and trotted back to his cover to wait.

 

If Lupin had taken his potion, he might be docile enough to be restrained or to leave after he was transformed, but if he hadn’t he would probably try and kill all three children and his best friend too. Even if Gaara had followed, he wouldn’t be able to do much of anything beyond providing an appetiser.

 

Underground, Lupin wasn’t happy about what was happening, but perhaps Sirius and he would finally be able to solve this farcical situation.

 

As he approached where he knew Sirius would have taken the Weasley boy, he heard raised voices and would have smacked his palm on his forehead were it not far too serious a moment for it.

 

“You betrayed my parents!”

 

“I am to blame for James and Lily’s deaths, and now it is time to finish what was started that night twelve years ago.”

 

He then heard a struggle and walked in to see Harry straddling Sirius with his wand pointed at the man’s throat.

 

“Expelliarmus!” Lupin cried as he entered the room properly, snatching Harry’s wand out of the air while training his own on Sirius.

 

“Well, Sirius. It looks like prison has brought out the madness within.”

 

“You would know all about the madness within, wouldn’t you, Remus.” Sirius said back.

 

Hermione thought that banter sounded a little rehearsed, but even her suspicions about Professor Lupin’s loyalties wouldn’t allow her to consider the possibility that these two grown men would possibly sit around coming up with back-and-forth routines.

 

Her suspicions about him were well-founded, it appeared, when instead of cursing the man, Lupin helped Black to his feet and handed him Harry’s wand. When no one was looking at her or Harry, she slipped him her wand. He was a much better fighter than she was.

 

“You’re working with him?!” Harry yelled.

 

“Now, Harry, there is a simple explanation for all of this…” Remus really wished Sirius could have explained himself, instead of using needlessly ambiguous declarative statements.

 

“Out of the way Remus, it’s time to commit the murder that I suffered in Azkaban for. Finally!”

 

“Now, wait a minute, he deserves to know why-”

 

“I’ve done my waiting! Twelve years of it! In Azkaban!” Sirius screamed, his wand pointing right at the three teenagers still cowering in the corner.

 

“I won’t let you hurt Harry!” Hermione said, finally pushing to the front to stand in front of him. “He’s a werewolf, Harry. That’s why he missed those classes and dinners!” She added, looking directly at Lupin.

 

“You really are the brightest witch of your age, Ms Granger.”

 

“I’m not planning to kill Harry, anyhow. The one I want to kill is him!” Sirius replied, directing his wand at Ron now.

 

“M-me?” Ron stammered.

 

“Not you, boy. Your rat!”

 

“Scabbers?” Ron’s hand snuck into his pocket immediately, finding the rat still where he had left it. The rat might have been able to crawl out after Ron had propped himself up on the wall, freeing his escape route, but Sirius had been watching, eagle-eyed.

 

“That’s the name he goes by now, but we knew him by a different name.” Remus said.

 

“You’re both mental!” Ron shouted, holding Scabbers to his chest protectively. “Scabbers has been in my family for years.”

 

“Twelve years, I’d wager. A long life for a common rat, don’t you think? And missing a toe, I should imagine.”

 

“So?” Ron was downright terrified now. Murderers were one thing, but nut jobs were another.

 

“When Peter Pettigrew was ‘killed’ twelve years ago, all they found of him was one finger. When the Daily Prophet featured a picture of your family in Egypt, Sirius here saw Pettigrew.”

 

“Peter Pettigrew? But you killed him.” Harry said.

 

“Oh, I wish!”

 

“Sirius was supposed to be the Secret Keeper, to protect your parents and you, Harry. Unbeknownst to me and everybody else, they decided to switch to Peter so that no one would go after the real one.”

 

“But you said you were responsible for killing them!” Harry pointed at Sirius.

 

“I was the one who suggested trusting that _rat_. I should have known he was the traitor. By the time I figured it out, it was already too late. James and Lily were gone, you were with Hagrid, and Peter had run off to rejoin Voldemort. When I caught up with him, he told everyone it was me, that I had betrayed them, and then he blew up the street and all those muggles. I was sure he was dead, too. I never would have thought he would have the gall to cut off his own finger.”

 

“I thought he was guilty for years too.” Lupin admitted. “I probably would have been the first one to volunteer to hunt him down when he escaped if he hadn’t come to me first. I didn’t want to believe I had been so wrong, but when I saw the picture, and when he explained his story to me, it all fit together too well. Mind you, I was still two steps away from handing him in to the dementors until I snuck him some Veritaserum.”

 

“I’m still can’t believe you did that.” Sirius snarked.

 

“You think Scabbers is that dead guy?” Ron asked, looking down at the familiar ratty face. Somehow he found himself trusting his family rat more than the convicted murderer and the new teacher at the school.

 

“I would recognise that face anywhere, in any form! I spent twelve years dreaming about it, thinking of all of the things I would say and all of the things I would _do_!”

 

“Expelliarmus!” Snape shouted as he moved into the room, ignoring the two wands that had shot out of Sirius’ and Remus’ hands. “Well, this is a pleasant surprise. I had hoped, only hoped that both of you were in it together. I can’t describe to you the pleasure I am going to take in handing you both over to the dementors. I’ve been told it is excruciating to simply watch their Kiss, but I will do my best. After all, we’re all old friends here.” The sickly smile was enough to warm the hearts of any dementor of goblin.

 

“I had half expected Gaara to be here too. Where is he, off raiding my Potion stores again?”

 

“Gaara?” Harry asked, looking at Sirius, wondering if there really was a connection.

 

“Uh…” Sirius wasn’t sure what to say.

 

“I knew his appearance was suspicious the moment I saw him. And then when the Headmaster asked him to stay I was sure of it. It was far too much of a coincidence, him showing just weeks after your narrow escape. How did you manage that, anyway?”

 

“Magic.” Sirius said, his smile back in place.

 

“Well, no matter. Now that this is all over, I’m sure whatever _dark_ secrets he is hiding will come out. If I had my way, he would have been out the first night he was in the castle. I tried to stun him and send him back to you, but his sand protection stopped me.”

 

“So Snape’s finally the bad guy!?” Ron shouted abruptly, looking around the room for confirmation.

 

“No, you simple boy-” Snape had rounded on Ron to give him a tongue lashing, but his wand was sent flying after Harry had cast the disarming charm on him.

 

When Snape looked like was going to dive for his wand on the floor, Harry stepped closer and held it at Snape’s head.

 

“Wait. We need to find out what’s happening here. Professor Lupin, please, is there any proof you can give us? Something? Anything?”

 

Lupin moved slowly to pick up his wand and then moved over to Ron. “Give him here, this shouldn’t hurt a bit.” He snatched the rat from the ginger’s hands and held it at arm’s length, disgust firmly etched onto his sickly face.

 

“Potter, as usual you have totally missed the danger in front of you. That man sold your parents to Voldemort. He needs to be punished!” Snape said angrily, not bothering to look at whatever Remus was up to with the Weasley family shoe brush.

 

“Oh do shut up, Severus. You never did know when to keep you enormous mouth shut or your even bigger nose out of other people’s business.” Sirius looked to be quite enjoying insulting Snape, but he used Harry’s distraction to pick up the wand he had taken off of the boy and trained it on the rat in Lupin’s hand.

 

Lupin dropped the rat onto the bed and they both pointed their wands at it, silently casting the Animagus Reversal Spell they had had to master in the Marauders early days when they were still learning their transformations.

 

“I didn’t know the madness of Azkaban could be passed between fools.” Snape cut in.

 

“Do be quite Severus or we will have to gag you.” Remus threw over his shoulder.

 

“Scabbers!” Ron cried, worried for his recently recovered pet’s safety.

 

Harry and Hermione, who were standing, watched as the rat on top of the bed started to wriggle and shiver in place before it started to shift. It was slow unlike most animagus transformations, with the arms sprouting from the small legs not unlike a tree growing from the ground. It continued to grow and morph, limbs changing from a small rodent’s to a man’s, the head swelling and flattening.

 

Until finally on the bed lay a shivering little fat man in an unbelievably grimy suit.

 

“It can’t be.”

 

“Not the first time you’ve been proven wrong, Severus.” Remus said, his eyes trained on Pettigrew.

 

“Now, it’s time to finish this.” Sirius said, practically licking his lips. He had really been looking forward to this.

 

“No, wait!” Harry called.

 

“No, Harry. This has to be done. This man is directly responsible for the deaths of your parents and who knows how many others. He betrayed us all and he cannot be allowed to live.” Normally the voice of reason, it came out all the darker coming from Lupin.

 

“No, p-please. My old friends!” Peter spoke for the first time in years to beg for his life. His features were uncannily ratty.

 

“You should have thought of that before you sold James and Lily out to Voldemort. You must have known if he didn’t kill you, we would!” Sirius shouted, just about ready to make an unforgiveable move.

 

“You don’t understand, the Dark Lord has powers you can’t imagine. You have no idea the weapons he possesses. He would have killed me! What would you have done? Either of you?!” He argued, now on all fours on the bed, unable to dismount without moving towards one of his murderous school friends.

 

“We would have died rather than betray our friends!”

 

“Wait, you can’t kill him!” Harry shouted again.

 

“He’s right, you can’t kill him, sir.” Hermione chimed in too.

 

“We can explain it later, but for now, I think both Sirius and I have earned this.”

 

“But if you kill him now, you’ll never be free. They’ll never believe you were innocent!”

 

This finally gave Sirius pause, looking back at the spitting image of James. “We can’t let him go…”

 

“I’m not saying we let him go. Give him to the dementors. Let him suffer like you did, and then you’ll be free.” Harry said.

 

“For once, Potter has a good idea. While I for one am disappointed at the thought of you not receiving a cruel and unusual punishment, Black, it would seem that Pettigrew is the one that needs to pay the price. I don’t know whether you still have the higher reasoning afforded to humans left after your time in Azkaban, but I trust Remus here can act as interpreter for you. Although, I suppose you can’t count on him for _human_ speech all the time, can you?”

 

Sirius looked quite upset at the prospect of his long awaited revenge being handed to someone else, but some small sliver of logic was getting through to him.

 

“Now, if someone with a wand and half a brain could conjure some ropes, we can take this _thing_ to the dementors and I will get my show after all.”

 

As dark and acerbic as the Potions master was at every opportunity, everyone was surprised at just how violent he could be. To be Kissed was said to be worse than death, and he seemed to be looking forward to it as much as Sirius. Harry couldn’t reconcile the man’s hatred of his father with his apparent need for revenge.

 

Snape’s wand was returned to him, and he turned it straight on Pettigrew and cast the binding spell he obviously didn’t trust anybody else to.

 

“Since it would seem the both of you are rather _well versed_ in animagus magic, would you two perhaps happen to know the proper warding spells to stop him from transforming?”

 

Sirius looked at Remus and vice versa.

 

“I shouldn’t have expected any different. If it can’t be used to inflict misery or pain on another, it doesn’t merit learning, I suppose. Just don’t take your eyes off of him. And Pettigrew, if I see so much as a whisker, I will take more than a finger.”

 

The fat, silently weeping man nodded.

 

“Why is it… that you happen to know so much about being an animagus? And Pettigrew here, an unremarkable wizard by any standard, was able to accomplish such a rare feat of magic?” Snape asked.

 

“Well, with Remus’ furry little problem, he needed someone to keep him occupied on the nights of the full moon. And you weren’t always available, Severus!” Sirius smirked. He was the only one of their group never to feel a deep remorse for that prank.

 

Snape sneered at his adversary, but kept his wand on Pettigrew nonetheless.

 

“So that’s how you escaped your cell. I wondered if one of your relatives had a hand in it.”

 

“I’m afraid not.” Sirius didn’t bother elaborating.

 

Ron had been in shock to find that the pet rat that had spent three years sleeping in the same bed as him, and a number of years with his brothers, all while being petted, fed and carried around like a real pet, had in fact been a dark wizard responsible for one of the biggest atrocities of the war against Voldemort. His first utterance upon returning to cognizance, was: “Why were you my rat?”

 

It was a pertinent question, and one that Remus had wondered more than once. Why not return to the Death Eaters he served, or run away entirely.

 

“Well, I was waiting for the Dark Lord to return, and if I showed my face to any of his followers, they might think I had sent him into a trap. You all know what the Lestranges did to the Longbottoms after the Dark Lord disappeared!”

 

The children and Sirius did not know, but Severus and Remus did, and they took the words in silently.

 

“A coward, through and through.” Sirius spat.

 

They all started moving back towards the castle, back through the narrow tunnel. With the encroachment of the dementor patrols, they couldn’t risk taking Sirius out into Hogsmeade without calling a swarm, and they needed the order to attack/Kiss on sight to be rescinded by a human.

 

Now that things had calmed down marginally, emotions were starting to bleed out again. While Snape and Lupin had the prisoner well in hand, Sirius was back with Harry helping to carry Ron who was still moaning. Of all people, Snape had been the one to suggest bandaging Ron’s arm ‘before that idiotic Weasley bleeds himself to death,’ and put a splint on his broken leg.

 

Harry couldn’t help but notice that Sirius wasn’t really helping that much with Ron’s weight, but he couldn’t hold it against the emaciated man since he clearly struggled with walking without stumbling, without any added burdens.

 

“I really am very sorry, Ronald. I usually have such a sweet disposition as a dog. More than once, Harry’s father suggested I make the change permanent. The tail I could live with, but the fleas are murder.”

 

Ron didn’t bother to respond, instead moaning when his hurt leg was jostled.

 

“I don’t suppose anyone’s ever told you this, Harry, but when you were born, your father and your mother named me your godfather.”

 

“Actually, I did know that.”

 

“Ah, yes, I suppose you were bound to at some point.”

 

Sirius, as bodacious as he was prone to being and as enthusiastic as he had been about meeting his godson, was now acting uncharacteristically meek now that he was talking directly to Harry. He had no idea how to talk to this boy who meant the world to him and who was actively working to save him.

 

“I saw your Quidditch games more than once this year. I think you would have given your dad a run for his money.”

 

“Wait, you saw me playing?”

 

“How could I miss it? You were amazing! Do you plan to play professionally after you finish your schooling?”

 

“No, I don’t think I could… the level the international players are on is… Wait, did you send me the Firebolt?”

 

“Oh, yes, I did. It wasn’t easy getting a hold of it, but I’ve missed too many birthdays and Christmases so I had better start making up for them, don’t you think?”

 

Harry blushed at the generosity, still so unused to receiving gifts, and never had he been given such an extravagant present. “Wait, so why did you send Gaara one too? Was it so they wouldn’t confiscate them?”

 

“No, I actually hadn’t even considered they would.” He laughed. “Severus was actually right about one thing, I do know Gaara. I met him when he first arrived in this… country.”

 

“So he was working with you the entire time?” Harry was feeling very vindicated. Even though Sirius had turned out to be a good man, Gaara was still working/spying for him.

 

“Well, not intentionally. He just sort of ended up attending Hogwarts before I knew it, and he had occasionally told me about what was happening in the castle, but I wouldn’t call him a spy.”

 

“So, if he was with you, why does he hate me so much?” Harry asked.

 

“You’d have to ask him that. He does have a bit of a temper, but he’s a nice boy. He was half dead when I found him, but when he was well enough, he insisted he help me find Peter and clear my name.”

 

Harry thought this over. It was a strange thing that Gaara _had_ been working with Sirius all along, but it was nothing to do with why he was so antagonistic towards them. It didn’t occur to Harry that the largest source of their conflicts had been a misunderstanding in which Harry had misconstrued Gaara’s actions and had then attacked him.

 

Instead he just settled on the opinion that while he might not be pure evil as once suspected, Gaara was still a bit of an arse.

 

“Harry, I wanted to ask you, once everything was sorted out of course, and I would understand if you wouldn’t want to, since you’ve probably built yourself a life there and everything, and you don’t really know me, and well…” Sirius was clearly struggling to ask something, so Harry waited patiently. Ron was barely conscious at this point from both the pain and the stress. And the blood loss wasn’t helping.

 

“Well, I was wondering if you might like to come and live with me after all of this had been sorted out? I understand if you want to continue living with your aunt and uncle, but-”

                    

“Are you crazy? Of course I want to leave the Dursleys! Have you got a house? When can I move in?” Harry jumped right on the possibility. This man who was friends with his parents, who was a wizard, who was kind and generous and funny (and who hated Snape) was asking if Harry wanted to live with him!

 

Sirius actually snuck his hand into his pocket to pinch himself, just to make sure he wasn’t dreaming. He’d had dreams like this one since he left Azkaban, but even they had never been this hopeful, the dementors having horribly damaged that part of his mind.

 

“Hold on, is Gaara going to be there?” Harry asked when he considered it.

 

Sirius laughed at that but confirmed that that was the plan, to which Harry laughed as well. Not so much at the prospect of living with Gaara as the infectiousness of his godfather’s levity in this rather strained circumstance. They settled down when their shaking shoulders elicited another groan from Ron.

 

At the front of the procession, Snape heard the combined laughter and had a horrible flashback to the last time he had heard that synchronised guffawing. With James Potter reborn, it looked like the Marauders had reunited once more, albeit briefly. The horror at the initial thought was calmed when he looked ahead to what the dementors would do to Pettigrew.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

At the Ministry, nothing was amiss. The group had taken to squabbling about whose budget would bear the weight of a prolonged protection detail being based at the school. No one had been able to agree on what that detail would be comprised of since the Hogwarts staff resolutely refused to allow the dementors to stay, and Lucius agreed that they were more dangerous than Black. Fudge argued on the side of his original plan, but didn’t seem to have any other arguments to back it up other than that it had been a good idea to begin with, breeding and deploying so many dementors.

 

Bones and Scrimgeour didn’t like the dementor situation, but said that their budget couldn’t afford to extend to full time protection of the massive school with Aurors. They might be able to spare two or three at most over a year, unless they received a massive injection of funds to pay for the additional Aurors to be trained and retained.

 

Whereas Sutherland and Barnett had stressed the dangers of this many dementors being away from Azkaban (their main food source) and their own struggling budgets.

 

As in almost all of the topics discussed before, Morbidus didn’t speak up on either side. The most he had said so far was confirming his attendance, and the multitude of things he had whispered in Fudge’s ear.

 

Beyond budgets there was also the question of responsibility. Since Azkaban had never had an escapee, it was something of a new issue. Was he the problem of the people who caught criminals, or the problem of the people who had let him escape. Barnett had even tried laying some of it on Hogwarts itself, saying that they were the ones that were being targeted and perhaps they needed to take some responsibility in protecting themselves.

 

Minerva had spent five very loud minutes explaining the flaw in that logic.

 

Albus had left her and Fillius to make most of their arguments for him as his mind was elsewhere. He was still terribly nervous about leaving the school. His old man’s intuition was screaming at him to return immediately as the school was probably being burned to the ground.

 

The only reason he hadn’t called a halt to the meeting was that he had this same feeling every time he left the castle for more than ten minutes, and it had yet to actually be destroyed (although there had been that nasty incident with Quirrel in ’92 when he had been away, and again with the Chamber when he had been suspended in ’93…)

 

Outside of the securely sealed meeting room stood the secretary, more for decoration than any sort of function. The grown man knew he was not actually being employed for any sort of useful purpose this evening, but he contented himself in knowing that he only had to stand and look professional so long as Mr Goyle was still skulking around. After the man got bored and left, he could settled down against the wall and start reading the latest best seller he had picked up from Flourish & Blotts over the weekend.

 

Gerald Goyle had been on the outside for too long. Not just tonight, but figuratively he had been pushed out months ago by Lucius who apparently had no more need for him and Crabbe. It had started when that poncey little Malfoy junior had kicked off about Vincent and Gregory for some reason. Then Lucius had _ordered_ them to get their sons to act more servile to precious little Draco. Of course, both Crabbe and Goyle had heeded the order since it was a relatively small price to pay.

 

They had been insignificant in the Dark Lord’s ranks during the First War, whereas the Malfoys had practically bankrolled Him. In other words, he had been above them for decades.

 

But after Vincent and Gregory had been scared off by that psychotic little upstart _Gaara_ , Lucius hadn’t said anything; he had just stopped asking for their help on projects. He had started including them in fewer meetings.

 

Both Gerald, and Anthony Crabbe were really quite low ranking Ministry grunts as well, but Lucius had always elevated their positions and lent them his power and title. Now, they were back down in the mud and it wasn’t right.

 

After all of the dirty jobs they had done for the man, for all of the distasteful things Gerald had done personally at Lucius’ command…

 

And here he was, having asked to be included in the important meeting between some of the most powerful people in the country, and Lucius had the nerve to tell him to go back to his desk! Because Gerald had a ‘deadline coming up’ and it _wouldn’t look good on his review_!

 

Well, that was it.

 

Lucius might have been a somebody in the Ministry, but in the _important_ circles, he was losing favour. He had spectacularly failed to find the Dark Lord even though those truly loyal to Him knew He was still living.

 

Well, if Lucius wasn’t going to help their Lord, Gerald would, and he had a feeling the Crabbe’s would feel the same way.

 

He left to go home and privately floo Anthony. Things were going to be changing, and Lucius would be on the outside for a change.

 

The Minister for Magic’s Most Senior Secretary didn’t know what Mr Goyle had been angrily muttering about, nor did he know for what purpose the large man had stomped off, he just knew he was now unobserved and he had the entire night to read in peace. Cornelius had ordered in food and drink for the entire day and night so that there would be no chance for interruption. He couldn’t attest to how useful that would be in the meeting, but the secretary certainly enjoyed the chance to slack off.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Emerging out into the crisp, star lit night, all seven of the willing and unwilling travellers were struck by varying degrees of relief at the sight of the castle. For some, it was the return to their safe school and home, for others it was a sight they had longed to return to since their childhood, and for one it was the last memory of goodness in an otherwise wicked and shallow life.

 

“I’m terribly glad you were here tonight, Professor.” Hermione said to Snape.

 

He considered reprimanding her for sucking up at a time like this, but instead settled for, “I, for one, am most certainly not glad I had the misfortune to get involved in this mess. If I hadn’t spotted Professor Lupin sneaking off under the Willow this evening, I might have been spared. My fault for adhering to my duties, I suppose.”

 

Hermione didn’t try to engage her Potions teacher again.

 

“So, all of this time you were just trying to catch him.” Harry nodded over to the miserable looking Pettigrew.

 

“Yes, do you remember when I broke in to the Gryffindor tower?”

 

“Of course! You caused a right mess!”

 

“Ah, well, I was a little excited to be back there, and as a dog I can be a little spirited.”

 

“You said all of you had learned how to do it. One was a _rat_ ,” He couldn’t keep the twist out of his voice, “you were a dog, Professor Lupin was a werewolf anyway, so what was my father?”

 

“Your father was a stag. Great big horns on his head. That’s why we called him Prongs.”

 

“Wait, Prongs? As in Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs?”

 

“How do you know about that?” Sirius asked, amazed, wondering if Lupin might have said it.

 

“I saw them on the Map, I had no idea it was the four of you. So, I can guess Professor Lupin is Moony, and my dad is Prongs. Which one were you?”

 

“I am Padfoot. I had all sorts of much more interesting names in mind, but your dad said my best feature were the soft pads on my feet. I called him an overgrown, hairy fork.”

 

“So, Wormtail is…” Harry looked over to the last member, but Sirius interjected.

 

“Dead. Wormtail died twelve years ago, as far I’m concerned. Peter is all that’s left, and pretty soon that will be gone too.” Harry quietened down a little.

 

“So, did my mum have a nickname too?”

 

“Oh, well, Lily you see came a little later. When we came up with those names, she still quite disliked us all for one reason or another. Trouble-makers, she called us. Well, among other things… She certainly had a way with words. Then, later on, when James and her were going out, they were much to _in love_ to bother with childish things like that.” Sirius couldn’t help the bitter note.

 

He also couldn’t help but think of the other ‘Lily’, by dint of a nickname, he knew. Of course, it wouldn’t be the time to mention that one right now.

 

“Lupin, while I am perfectly capable of keeping watch over a _wizard_ of Pettigrew’s calibre on my own, I would just as well you didn’t stare off into…” Snape trailed off as he realised the real problem with his absent-minded fellow guard.

 

Lupin was looking straight up into the clearing skies as the clouds opening up to reveal the huge full moon shining down on them.

 

Snape pulled Peter back away from Lupin who still didn’t move, while Sirius had just noticed the issue and jumped up to try and reason with his friend.

 

“Remus, did you take you potion tonight?!”

 

But Lupin wasn’t home right now. All that was left was the wolf, waiting for his body to correct itself.

 

Sirius kept trying to bring Lupin back out of himself, just long enough to get him away to safety. Instead, the changes started to happen throughout the man’s body, his limbs lengthening just moments before he swung his arm at the escaped convict and sent him flying.

 

Harry and Hermione cowered by Ron who was still unconscious, and watched, terrified as their most beloved professor became a nightmare in front of their eyes. The change didn’t take too long, but it was graphic. It wasn’t the organic transition of an animagus transformation, it was more akin to the bones under the skin rearranging themselves to be more wolf-like, and then the flesh on top melting and reforming to match.

 

By the time he/it had finished, the unfamiliar onlookers were stunned and afraid. They didn’t dare breathe for fear of inciting the inevitable attack from a creature renowned for its universal aggression. Unfortunately, Ron, asleep, groaned and shifted, drawing the gaze of the wolf.

 

It howled loudly and then stepped towards them, eyes not straying. It wasn’t some connection to the man within, the eyes it was making were of a predator who had caught sight of an easy supper.

 

Harry wasn’t sure because he was so scared, but he thought he saw it like its lips.

 

It’s stalking approach was halted when Snape stepped up in front of them and cast a shield charm just in time to block the clawed swipe that would have either opened up the man’s throat or at least insured he would be brewing the Wolfsbane Potion for himself from now on.

 

The wolf attacked ferociously and without pause, its paws and teeth running harmlessly off the invisible barrier Snape had erected, but not without cost. It was causing a visible strain to maintain the shield for so long under a prolonged assault from a magical beast. Harry wanted to do something to help, but his shield charm was not up to this standard and he couldn’t do anything to subdue the wolf without probably hurting it (or, more likely, pissing it off).

 

Snape was having the same difficulty. If he released the shield, he might be able to fire of a spell in time, but he was not expert on handling magical creatures. His specialities were Potions and the Dark Arts, and any spell he could be sure would work on a werewolf would also probably cause Lupin lasting damage.

 

This wasn’t going to stop him though as his defence was going to give out soon and he wouldn’t risk his own life, much less the lives of the ones behind him, for the sake of Lupin of all people. He was just starting to read the wolf’s timing so that he could take it down and fire off his counterattack, when he and the wolf were saved by Sirius who had jumped on the werewolf’s back.

 

The man-turned dog had attacked fiercely in the split second he could before the much larger werewolf managed to buck him off. Padfoot rolled to a stop but got straight back up, ignoring the likely broken ribs the fall had caused, and attacked again. And again. And again.

 

He kept lunging at the gigantic wolf-man only to be batted away or thrown off after managing only a bite or a scratch. Each time he was sent to the hard ground, it took him a little longer to get back up.

 

With everyone’s focus on the one-sided dog fight, Harry ducked out from behind Snape and ran to the side. He picked up a large rock and threw it as hard as he could at Moony who had grown tired of the small canine’s interference and was now planning to finish it.

 

The rock flew straight and true and smacked the enormous hound on the back of the head. Harry hadn’t thought it would knock Professor Lupin out or even stun him, it had been an impulsive move on his part to save his godfather.

 

Now that there was an angry werewolf focussing entirely on him and with no shield charm to protect him, Harry wondered if there might have been a better move to make.

 

He backed up as far as he could but ended up tripping on a root and was sent sprawling onto the ground. Sirius wasn’t moving, and Snape looked about ready to cast something deadly at Lupin.

 

Harry wracked his brain but nothing would come to mind. There was nothing he could do. Either he was going to die, or Professor Lupin was.

 

The  wolf, who had been very upset to begin with, was literally snarling after Harry had fallen over, taking the quick motion as a sign of aggression. Its snout was no more than five feet away from Harry’s feet when a sandy blur flew out from behind the tree and struck Lupin across the face.

 

What Harry had at first thought and hoped might be Gaara’s sand turned out to be the entirely unrelated little animal they had been chasing earlier. It had jumped up and swung its entire body to smack Lupin with its disproportionately large tail.

 

Instead of the soft pat from a tail with that much fluff around it that Harry would have expected, it had knocked the werewolf away like an iron mace.

 

Suddenly, Harry was no longer werewolf enemy number one. Moony had turned towards the significantly smaller animal and taken off after it when it darted around the Whomping Willow and out of sight.

 

In a matter of seconds, the werewolf was gone and they were safe. Harry’s first thought was to check on Sirius, but where the dog had landed was now empty.

 

He swivelled to check on his best friends and his most hated professor, only to find them in a panic.

 

“Harry, it’s Pettigrew, he’s escaped!” Hermione yelled.

 

Ron was still unconscious and none the wiser, but Snape was looked very unhappy about the pathetic rat’s escape, and Hermione was frantic as ever as she searched through the nearby plants to try and find the rodent. Harry wanted to do the same and together they might have a good chance of catching Pettigrew before he got too far, but the more pressing issue was Sirius.

 

Harry looked more closely at where Sirius had landed, and in the silver light of the full moon he could see the shiny black of blood leading off further down the hill to the forest.

 

“Potter, where do you think you’re going? It cannot have escaped even your notice that there is a werewolf in the immediate vicinity. Are you honestly so foolhardy or arrogant that you want to chase after it?!”

 

Harry turned to Snape, “Sirius is hurt. I have to go and help him, sir.”

 

“It’s too dangerous, Harry!” Hermione said.

 

Ron seemed to stir with the renewed yelling but then went still again. If Snape were a betting man, which a life of bad luck and worse choices had precluded, he would have put money on Weasley sleeping through the entire night at this rate.

 

“We can’t leave him. He’s bleeding, and…and he’s still a fugitive. We need to get him somewhere safe before a dementor finds him and Kisses him!”

 

Harry wasn’t going to wait any longer, so he trudged through the bushes and down the hill towards the Dark Forest to find his missing godfather. Hermione wanted to rush after him but a stern cough reminded her that Professor Snape needed a little help carrying Ron.

 

The following duo struggled considerably hefting Ron’s limp weight through the undergrowth after their determined ‘leader.’

 

They couldn’t leave Ron out in the open like this, but Snape also couldn’t send Harry into the forest alone, nor could he leave Hermione to try and carry Ron up to the castle on her own (not that she would walk away from Harry’s plight either), so the odd pair had to heft the unconscious ginger around with them.

 

Harry had followed the trail of blood for as long as he could see it, but then he had to rely on guesswork as the canopy blocked out all light for metres at a time and he was stumbling through in total darkness. When he walked back into the light, he had to search all over again to pick up the trail.

 

Obviously Sirius had been acting entirely on instinct after his injury, limping away with his tail between his legs despite safety lying in the opposite direction.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Running about twenty feet in front of a snarling werewolf, Gaara was considering whether there might have been a better solution to Potter’s impeding lycanthropic problems. He didn’t have sand, chakra, or magic, nor the physical ability to actually fight the man-wolf, so really his choices had been limited to begin with.

 

As he skirted close to a tree, hoping his smaller size would give him the manoeuvrability to get away, he also thought on whether Potter wouldn’t have liked to be a werewolf…

 

Lupin was obviously untreated, which set him on a high level of aggression to begin with. Add to that the fight with a dog, a rock thrown at his head, morsels hiding behind shields, and now small animals clubbing him with their tails, and you got a very upset wolf.

 

Gaara’s tail was waving in the wind as he ran like he had never run before. Most of his life had involved standing still and letting his sand slaughter those around him. Once in a while he had been required to make a tactical retreat, but never before had he had to flee for his life so desperately. There might have been some insight to take from this experience, but Gaara was struggling to keep ahead of the larger beast behind him so he couldn’t afford to let his mind wander for more than a second.

 

When he heard the wolf gaining on him, he decided to risk imminent death and take action, rather than keep running aimlessly and eventually get snapped up like a fleeing rabbit.

 

The action was not nearly as decisive or violent as he would have liked, but jumping on to a low branch and scrambling up the trunk of a tall tree to safety was effective. He watched the wolf jump at the tree and try to climb it after him, but it’s awkwardly proportioned body wasn’t good for much beyond running and fighting.

 

After a few attempts, the werewolf gave up on trying to reach the uppity snack and began circling the tree trunk.

 

Gaara supposed this was an acceptable solution. Either the werewolf would eventually get bored and go away, or they would both be able to wait until the moon fell and the sun rose. Granted, there would be a fair amount of initial awkwardness with the public nudity and discovery that Lupin wasn’t the only one concealing a lunar secret, but compared to being mauled it was a (somewhat) preferable choice.

 

Then again, with the way Lupin had been savaging Padfoot earlier, Gaara wanted to go and make sure the man/dog was okay. Not that Gaara could offer much practical help, but he wouldn’t be able to sit idle with the possibility that Sirius was out in the forest somewhere, bleeding to death.

 

So, contrary to his dignity, Gaara started trying to communicate with the angry wolf in the only way he could.

 

As an animal, he tried to be as silent as his human form because it would have drawn attention to his secret problem, and because tanuki made the worst noises. Still, he had to do what he had to do…

 

He made a couple of urgent yips and whines which seemed to grab Lupin’s attention. He received a few barks and growls in return. Gaara wasn’t entirely sure what he was ‘saying’ or what Lupin was replying with, but he hoped his intents were being communicated.

 

The two exchanged a few more noises before Gaara remembered what had been nagging on the back of his neck: the bone he had originally brought to distract the wolf . He struggled reaching over his back to pull of the cloth bundle, but when he did, it immediately caught Moony’s attention, the more powerful wolf nose zeroing in on the meaty bone in an instant.

 

Making a couple more pathetic whining sounds, Gaara then threw the bone to Mooney and watched the beast catch it. The wolf huffed rather angrily with the bone in his teeth and then ran off like it had lost interest in Gaara, which it probably had considering the treat it was now savouring.

 

So, disbelieving, he stayed on the branch for ten more minutes, waiting for Moony to come running back at the drop of a hat. When he couldn’t hear anyone coming nor could he see or smell anyone or anything nearby, he took the risk and descended to the forest floor and took off back the way he came.

 

He swerved when he could scent of Potter and his group in the forest and ran after that.

 

It was still hours until dawn and his transformation back to being a human and he could only pray to whatever gods might still listen to a monster’s prayers that nothing else would happen before he was re-empowered.

 

Outside of the castle, Draco had finally arrived back at the tree line with Gaara’s pile of clothes under his arm and his gourd floating in front of his wand, only to find the boy-tanuki had run off somewhere.

 

He sighed and wondered whether he could get away with going back inside and waiting for his friend to return where it was warm and much safer. The howling he could hear in the distance reminded him of Gaara’s terrifying jokes about there being a werewolf in the forest.

 

Probably not.

 

Though, as much as he cared for Gaara, there was no way he was ever stepping foot inside of the forest at night ever again. He had strolled through the Forbidden Forest at night during his first year, and he had vowed then that he never would again.

 

He had also vowed never to say more than five consecutive words to Potter again, but he might have broken that one already. For one, he was pretty sure one of the insults he had flung at him in second year had been around seven highly creative and insulting words long.

 

The Boy-Who-Lived himself was starting to fear that one of the acromantulas had happened across the wounded dog and had taken if for an easy meal, when he finally happened upon the man next to a small lake. Sirius had at some point transformed back into a human, and was lying next to the water’s edge, unconscious and not visibly breathing.

 

Fearing for the worst all over again, Harry darted forward and checked his godfather’s pulse as he had seen doctors do on the television. The soft pulse took him too long to find for his peace of mind, but by the time Snape and Hermione had dragged Ron into the clearing, he thought he might have located the beat he was looking for.

 

Luckily, Severus was much more adept at checking for vitals and, after dumping Ron onto the ground, he quickly confirmed that Sirius was alive and not in _immediate_ danger of dying. He did urge them to move the waste of skin to somewhere warm if they wanted his living to continue beyond the next five or six hours, but he didn’t try too hard to persuade them.

 

“Whassatiting…?” Ron mumbled as he came too again. He looked around from where he was on the floor, very much out of it.

 

“Ron, we’re in the forest. You hurt your leg, remember?” Hermione said, moving back over to him.

 

“Oh… right.” Ron said, none too pleased to wake up to this reality.

 

Hermione helped Ron get to his feet, supporting him as he hopped on with his working foot, while Snape levitated Sirius. The look on Severus’ face made it clear he didn’t like even his magic coming into contact with the pile of rags called Black.

 

It took them hours to shamble towards the castle, being held back by Ron most of all who was barely able to limp through the uneven ground and root systems with Hermione supporting him. Harry had been lighting the way, but as they slowed to a crawl to make sure his friends didn’t get left behind, he went back and helped Hermione carry Ron.

 

Snape, hating his task, got progressively more and more agitated the longer they lingered in the forest. He spared the children his musings, but he knew the dementors routinely wandered beyond the school ground’s boundaries and into the Forbidden Forest, and as soon as one of them caught the scent of Black, they would all flock towards them.

 

Even with a Patronus or two, there was no hope if they were surrounded.

 

While the teenagers were ignorant of that risk, they too had their own share of anxieties. Harry’s mostly revolved around not getting back to the castle in time to save his godfather. Hermione was concerned that Professor Lupin might reappear once he had eaten whatever that small animal was that had distracted the werewolf. It looked very similar to the drawings Luna Lovegood had distributed a while back, but Hermione couldn’t fathom why the Ravenclaw’s missing pet would be involved in all of this.

 

Ron, as ever, was just terrified of running into spiders; although, his mind was preoccupied by all of the pain he was in too.

 

Had any of them been able to see beyond the trees, they would have known they were only a mile away from the castle, but then a chill started to spread along the ground and into their minds and spirits.

 

As Snape had predicted, one of the wraiths had strayed off of its mandated patrol route and had wandered into their path. It would have taken great joy in attacking simply for the five delicious souls there, but when it sensed Sirius Black, it shrieked in jubilation and swooped down to claim its sanctioned prey.

 

Snape had dropped Sirius to the ground as soon as he had seen the cloak floating up by the branches and stretched his wand out towards the monster. “Expecto Patronum.” He declared, calmly but resolutely, calling up memories from years before. The silvery mist burst from his wand and shooed the dementor away.

 

This might have scared the thing off had it not smelt Black’s distinct soul. Instead, it swooped past the incorporeal Patronus, trying to feed of the light magic until it had exhausted the flimsy protection. At that point, Severus cast a full powered Patronus that formed an impassable barrier that would protect them.

 

Harry might have considered why Professor Snape had a _doe_ as his Patronus, but instead his eyes flew to the other side of the clearing where a second dementor had appeared from amongst the dark woods. It flew right at them; so, without bothering Snape, Harry shouted, “Expecto Patronum!” Casting his own silvery mist to fend off the dementor at the other side.

 

Snape’s Patronus’ light quickly moved to encompass the entire group from all sides, but Harry kept up his own less powerful attempt to supplement their barrier. They would have been fine with just Snape’s doe protecting them but for the dementors that had started drifting towards them.

 

Unlike the first one that had sounded the war cry, the rest floated down like jellyfish descending en masse to overwhelm their targets.

 

Dumbledore, as per usual, had definitely been correct when he had warned at the beginning of the year that dementors didn’t distinguish between those they hunted and those that got in their way.

 

With both Harry and Snape casting Patroni, there was no way to move both Sirius and Ron at the same time, so the group was pinned down.

 

Fortunately, with Severus’ magical power, a few dozen dementors weren’t enough to drain him or his Patronus.

 

It was after the minutes turned into hours, the hours wore on and the flow of dementors never seemed to end, that Snape began to struggle under the combined weight. The dozens had turned into hundreds and his Patronus that could hold back three dozen dementors indefinitely had begun to dim and falter. Harry kept on casting his own shield, but that got sucked up within minutes and had to be recast.

 

Ron and Hermione were helpless in the bubble of light, the only use they could offer was occasionally screaming when the light had thinned too much in one area and a dementor was getting too close. All through this, Sirius hadn’t regained consciousness, which Ron envied a great deal.

 

Under the increased burden, Snape knew his doe was minutes away from fading altogether and leaving them at the nonexistent mercy of the hundreds of dementors that had entered the school grounds to fulfil the only directive they were interested in following: find Sirius Black and feed.

 

Harry panicked and in a moment of both desperation and hope, he called forth his own corporeal Patronus, conjuring forth memories, hopes and dreams of happiness.

 

The stag stood next to the doe and together they were able to hold the horde at bay, as long as Harry’s and Serverus’ magic held out.

 

Stuck under the swarm that was circling around their protected patch, the group couldn’t see nor could they stop the remaining majority of the dementors from drifting over them to the castle.

 

The hundreds surrounding Harry, Snape, Ron, Hermione and the injured Sirius, did not stop in their assault, but the rest of the entirety of the dementors that had been bred and brought to Hogwarts had not been able to sense their target through their brethren. They had gone to the next most attractive thing: the castle full of anguished teenagers, ripe for the Kissing.

 

Maybe three or four hundred black cloaks were surrounding Harry and Severus’ dwarfed enclosure, but at least five hundred had begun to move to the school where they sensed their meal.

 

When the first cry had gone out hours ago, the dementors had immediately wanted to rush to the scene but their wranglers had tried to stop them fearing exactly this eventuality. Sadly, they had been isolated from one another and had been overwhelmed in time from the sheer numbers.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Gaara had found Sirius about the same time as Harry had, being able to run through the dense, dark forest much quicker than the Boy-Who-Lived, who had to visually track his godfather. The red-head was unhappy to be beaten to the rescue, but he accepted that there wasn’t a whole lot he could have done anyway had he arrived first; he couldn’t even drag the man when he was this small.

 

With Snape and Hermione showing up to help, and Weasley to hinder, he figured he wasn’t needed at the moment anyway. Even though he hated Snape (for good reason), the sadistic Potions professor wasn’t likely to do anything malicious now after helping Sirius earlier.

 

It didn’t escape Gaara’s notice that Pettigrew was missing from their little group, presumably having escaped during Lupin’s transformation. In this form, he didn’t hold out much hope that he would be able to track the rat down after he had such a lead. Plus, no matter that he could not actually offer any assistance as he was, Gaara didn’t like the idea of leaving 

 

He followed behind the group as far as he could manage without losing sight of them. Luckily Snape was able to magically find his way back to the castle, or at least head in what Gaara thought was the right direction.

 

Gaara contented himself by swatting away the occasional stray spider he came across that were fortunately smaller than himself. He had no doubt Snape or even one of the others would have been able to banish or otherwise vanquish such meagre giant spiders, but they had enough on their plates and Gaara felt utterly useless as he was. Anything he could do to help.

 

And he would never tire of killing those spiders.

 

He felt them in his fur long before he saw the dementors approaching. The first one came from the far side of the clearing the group had been passing through and he had almost dashed out to warn them when Snape had spotted it and reacted immediately. The entirely inhuman shriek it had released had Gaara more worried than ever. He had rarely heard such a cry, and it had almost always been shortly before or after he had murdered one of them, and then a group were always soon to follow.

 

True to memory, another came soon after, right passed Gaara.

 

As an animal, one of the few perks, he was unaffected and ignored by the dementor as it passed him by. He could have been a woodlouse for all the dementor cared about the small tanuki crouched by the clearing’s edge. A meal was in front of it and dementors were voracious.

 

It had been proven before that while he might struggle against large spiders and even fight a werewolf (briefly), he had no way of combating a dementor in this form. So Gaara was forced to watch helplessly as the dementors multiplied exponentially, submerging Potter and Snape’s Patroni bubble in a maelstrom of black cloaks.

 

The concentrated effects of the mass of dementors had even started to seep into Gaara’s animal mind so he had been forced away from the edge of the action and back into the treeline. Further away from the ones in front of him, he took notice of the countless number that were slowly floating over towards the castle, overlooking the attack below them.

 

The sun was going to be rising soon, he hoped, and he needed to get back to his sand otherwise he would transform in the midst of a dementor incursion the likes of which had not been seen in fifteen hundred years, before wizards had started employing them to guard their criminals. If he transformed unarmed where he was, he would likely be Kissed within minutes.

 

It was after a shameful delay that he remembered one vital piece of information connected to his sand and clothes: he had left Draco outside holding them.

 

Outside of the castle, where a flock of dementors were about to sweep through.

 

Draco didn’t know the Patronus Charm, he couldn’t even slow them down! Gaara started running as fast as he could back to the castle, faster even than when Lupin had been on his tail.

 

He had to beat them there at all costs.

 

When he was nearing the castle, within a hundred metres or so, he could hear the faintest screaming from terrified or traumatised students being protected by a combination of their remaining professors’ Patroni and Hogwarts’ own wards and protective stone walls. The dementors were mostly clustered around the towers, presumably smelling the rich Gryffindor and Ravenclaw souls within, just out of reach.

 

Without the Headmaster there, the professors couldn’t activate any of the more substantial wards to repel the dementors, so they were resorting to using their own Patroni and barricading themselves and students in their Houses. Fortunately, all of the students were together in their dormitories since it was before dawn, but the teachers themselves had to struggle towards their students through the hallways that were all too quickly infested.

 

It had been luck that had woken Hagrid and a couple of other professors in the castle when the dementors had started communicating across the skies. They had seen the impending attack through the windows and had rallied the rest of the staff to either get to the students or protect themselves.

 

All of this was pretty dire, but Gaara had no time for it. He didn’t care about the hundreds that could lose their souls in the castle. In that moment, he didn’t even think to care about the five out in the forest, including a dear friend, who might lose theirs.

 

In that moment as he broke the tree line, all Gaara could think about was that his other dear friend was being approached by two dementors and had no defence against them.

 

Draco had obviously spotted the threat just a little while ago and had tried making a break for the castle entrance, but two dementors had glided down and cut him off, and were now lazily flying towards him to take what couldn’t be recovered.

 

He looked so scared he might throw up, both the despair of the situation and the multiplied depressive effect of the dementors’ presence taking their toll on his mind and soul. He had his wand out, and tried casting a blasting hex and something dark that he had probably learned from his father, but neither had the slightest effect. They either passed through or slipped harmlessly off the incoming pair, without slowing them or discouraging them.

 

Gaara ran forward to try and bash one of them with his tail only to deal a glancing blow against the insubstantial body that similarly failed to impede its movements. He jumped at the other with his claws out to try and…

 

He didn’t have any sort of strategy. His only thinking was that Draco was doomed if he didn’t do something. The intended target swung its arms and batted Gaara away without sparing a glance for the inedible creature.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

In the upper areas of the Ministry, far away from where the sealed and secluded meeting was still taking place, Crabbe and Goyle ranted. They furiously, and in hushed voices, complained to each other about Lucius’ many failings. Including how he had not taken a stronger anti-muggle, anti-mudblood stance as both a high-ranking member of the Wizengamot and prominent member of the Hogwarts Board of Governors.

 

He had made himself rich but he hadn’t done much of anything for the Dark Lords followers besides making sure they didn’t starve. But worst of all, besides failing to recognise Gerald and Anthony’s skills and worth, Lucius had not brought the Dark Lord back as he promised he would.

 

After the Dark Lord had disappeared (because he had _not_ fallen), and the Lestranges and Crouch had been sent to Azkaban, Lucius had stepped up and taken charge of the purists, promising all the while that he would work ‘tirelessly’ to find the Dark Lord and return him to Britain so that he could resume his good works.

 

Instead, the ponce had pocketed all of that goodwill and had climbed the political ladder on their backs and ignored the real issues.

 

For years now, there had been persistent rumours in the right circles that something _dark_ was lurking out in Eastern Europe, and that it could be Him. The rumours were definitely reaching Lucius’ ears as they had reached everyone else’s, but when they tired of him doing nothing, they broached the subject and he had played none the wiser and then dismissed it as just _gossip._

Gerald was just about to suggest something radical when a commotion arrived outside their shared office in the main foyer. It was far too late (or early) for anybody to be up to any good, so they disappeared lest they come under even more suspicion.

 

The ruckus had been caused by the arrival of the majority of the Auror corps. Coming in from their homes under orders from their watch commander, they all marched straight for the Magical Law Enforcement offices to join those on-call and get their orders.

 

An urgent report had been flooed in from Hogwarts: that the entire school was under attack from the full force of dementors that had been stationed up there. The floo-call had been from a professor who explained, in a panic, that the school was besieged and the headmaster wasn’t there, so the floos wouldn’t allow anyone to pass through. To escape or to help.

 

The clerk manning the desk on the early shift had fallen out of his chair in shock and had then proceeded to notify the Auror watch commander who called in every Auror they had on roster, some of which had only gone home three hours before.

 

The issue then became, when they were all assembled, that Minister Fudge had ordered not only himself but the Head Auror and the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement as well as the Chief Warlock into a sealed meeting and they had no way of contacting any of them to request orders.

 

The Auror corps. had very little in the way of autonomy to avoid any possibility of a coup. In other words, they were expressly forbidden to act unless they received orders from a superior. For a full and rapid deployment (and the resulting overtime authorisation), they needed one of the people currently stuck in the one room they couldn’t get into.

 

The watch commander was stuck, as any action could be seen as treasonous, but the fact remained that a school was under attack from dementors. He asked for volunteers to come with him, knowing full well they could go to a place where they have to deal with dementors on a daily basis if things didn’t go well, and half of the corps. raised their hands.

 

The other half, he ordered with what was left of his authority to go and try anything to break down the Ministry Meeting Room doors so that an official action could be taken and also so Hogwarts could get its Headmaster back.

 

The two groups split and went their separate ways: one down into the bowels of the Ministry to break down doors that were specifically designed and warded against such assaults, and the other went to the many floos along the Ministry Atrium.

 

They had to go to the nearest connected and open floo in Hogsmeade and from there they would travel to the castle that, as they understood it, had already been flooded with dementors.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Gaara panicked, but he was powerless to do anything but watch as one of the dementors grabbed Draco around the throat while the other leaned in close and started to suck in Draco’s happiness, then his essence, and then… a light.

 

Gaara was no expert on the matter, many having denied him having one, but he was pretty sure the light now starting to drift out of Draco’s lips was his very soul. And the dementors were watching and waiting for it to flow out of him entirely before they tucked in for their early breakfast.

 

The pure white light, as he stared at it, seemed to turn a shade of light pink and even seemed to dim a little. Gaara looked around and realised the sun had just peeked over the horizon and the sky had turned a wondrous colour belying the horrors that were happening under it.

 

Gaara had never wished or urged the change back to his human self so desperately before and he couldn’t be sure if his wishing had any effect; but in moments, where the small ineffectual tanuki had been, now stood a short, incredibly angry Jinchūriki.

 

His gourd was only a few feet away, and with it he called out a sand cover for himself, and then went to work, all the while the same words running around his head on a loop: _“The dementors Kiss is said to be a fate worse than death!”_

 

Draco’s soul had been drawn out of his body, and Gaara was angry like this world had never seen before.

 

His eyes filling with all of the old malice and hatred, his hand reached out and directed the sand to surround the dementors. He didn’t spare them another thought, simply clenching his fist and crushing both. His sand caught Draco’s husk before he could reach the hard ground, but he left him there.

 

He would return soon and decide what to do then. If it truly _was_ a fate worse than death, he would be forced to…

 

He couldn’t even think it.

 

Rendering the two in front of him into dust had done nothing to sate his insane malice, so Gaara rose into the air where the slow incoming dementors were still floating towards the castle.

 

His raging sadness, hatred and bloodlust and now outpouring of chakra began acting like a beacon for the wraiths. The ones not already in the castle or crawling all over the towers or trying to get into the dorms, flew at Gaara now, in order to taste this powerful delicacy.

 

He sand speared through them like they were no more than tissues in the wind but as he tore apart of crushed three or seven or a dozen, three dozen more replaced them. Even his sand soon reached the limits of its attacks when he was surrounded by the absurd number of creatures. He resorted to hiding in his sand shell and using what little spare sand he had to attack from safety. If this continued, he would not only fail to protect anyone else, he would never manage to slaughter these things before he was exhausted.

 

The students watching safe from inside the spell-sealed windows had been entranced by the spectacle of Gaara rising amongst the dementors, shrouded in sand and tearing apart the monsters like they were nothing. The spectacle had been almost a comfort, their old nightmarish schoolmate seeming almost comical amongst the actual nightmares trying to force their way in and suck out their souls.

 

In the midst of the carnage, Gaara needed more sand, and for this kind of eventuality he had been planning for months.

 

The Ravenclaws brave enough to look out the window while the dementors outside clamoured to press up against it, soon shouted out what their Housemates thought was lunacy.

 

“The Abandoned Tower! It’s melting!”

 

The large tower that had been empty and left to decay for a hundred years was indeed falling apart, but not under the influence of the dementors. They didn’t seem to notice or care as the entire tower’s worth of stone and mortar fell away from the castle and then curled around in the air. The entire structure had dissolved into what looked like grey water from a distance.

 

Gaara had meditated in that enormous tower day after day, infusing the stone with his chakra, carving out the individual rocks and pebbles, grinding them into sand, and then hardening them back into place like nothing had happened. All so that he would have a plentiful source of sand at his disposal when an emergency arose.

 

His sand was now of such quantity that he didn’t have to worry about the dementors coming anywhere near him. With a soft swipe of the enormous mass of powdered stone, he crushed or knocked away a great swath of the black cloaked soul eaters that had been surrounding him.

 

The sand turned to blades and cut through the dementors so quickly and angrily, for a moment the spectators worried that they weren’t being saved but instead being fought over by two equally insidious monsters. Most of them hadn’t been able to make out exactly who or what had been attacking the dementors from so far away in the morning light, but soon word started circulating that it was Gaara of all people, using his sand ability to combat this terrible threat.

 

Many still couldn’t believe a third year, no matter how peculiar, was able to control such a spell and kill so many dementors like they were flies buzzing around him.

 

Furthermore, none of them could tell why Gaara’s sand, which had always looked just like animate sand and had moved like a liquid or a fixed solid structure, was now lined with blue highlights and was starting to form into organic shapes.

 

Almost unrecognisable, but one of the tendrils of sand that had pierced through the surrounding dementors and had flown straight past a Gryffindor bedroom window, almost looked like a hand, or a set of claws.

 

The gigantic, shifting mass of sand circled loosely around Gaara, and seemed to increasingly be comprised of these separate almost living arms. They continued to attack, but even from afar the watching students and teachers could see the sadistic violence behind the attacks was not about protecting them safely and efficiently. Gaara, or whoever it really was out there, was slaughtering the dementors to see them die.

 

It was scary in an entirely different way from the doom that had been looming over them minutes before.

 

In his rage, Gaara had unconsciously started to draw upon Shukaku’s demonic chakra more and more, channelling it into his sand and letting it seep into his distraught mind, turning his anger into unfettered wrath.

 

The dementors started to thin out as he attacked again and again and again and again, tearing them apart, crushing them, impaling them, bisecting them, shooting them full of holes…

 

Soon enough, he was no longer surrounded, but having to search around for dementors to kill. His sand arms, numbering at least twenty, curled into the castle’s orifices and blindly lanced or grabbed the fluttering cloaks bustling around and tore them out into the dawn sky.

 

And finally, when he had destroyed every last dementor in sight, and had sent his sand into the school to root out the ones still trying to feed in the school, Gaara flew out over the forest on his sand platform to where he had last seen Sirius.

 

There, like before, were hundreds of dementors still pressing against Snape’s and Potter’s Patroni, although the size of the shield had shrunk considerably and the casters were looking quite ill from the ongoing acute magical depletion.

 

That pale, sickly look only got worse for Snape when he caught sight of Gaara after a number of dementors had been torn away from their Patroni barrier. It wasn’t that he thought Gaara was here to kill him, he felt unwell because he was finally seeing how powerful the boy truly was.

 

Snape had been right all along: the boy was a weapon. And it made Severus sick.

 

Harry was only too glad to see Gaara come to the rescue. He might have preferred Dumbledore, Professor Lupin, McGonagall, or their incompetent Minister for Magic, but if Gaara was the only one there to help, he wouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth. He also wouldn’t look Gaara in the eye, but that was because no matter how much he had saved Harry’s life, Gaara was still a jerk and creepy as all hell.

 

That opinion was only confirmed when he saw how Gaara was attacking the creatures surrounding them. It was brutal.

 

Or, as Ron said, “He’s bloody mental alright, but thank Merlin he’s here!”

 

Hermione had been strangely quiet for the past hour, the shock making her shut down, but she had perked up when she saw Gaara was there to help.

 

The curse of her intellect, she had assessed all of their options after being surrounded and had despaired when she concluded they were going to die… if they were lucky.

 

Gaara had not spared a single one of them. His sand had taken on a strange form, but it was still definitely sand, albeit much more than they had ever seen him with, and it had sought out the soul stealers in groups and destroyed them quickly and easily.

 

Every time one of them slipped past the attacks and came close to Gaara, the sand that was still around him spiked out and killed it.

 

“Sir, Professor Lupin told us at the beginning of the year that it was really difficult to kill demetors, that the Patronus charm was the only way to protect yourself.” Hermione said.

 

Snape would have reprimanded the know-it-all, but he couldn’t fault her question. Killing dementors was next to impossible using magic, and with physical objects it was still notoriously difficult. Wizards knew better than to try and kill a dementor when they could keep it at bay with the Patronus Charm.

 

It wasn’t even a bad joke to suggest going on the offensive when literally surrounded by the monsters.

 

And yet here Gaara was…

 

Well, ‘going on the offensive’ didn’t quite describe what Gaara was doing. That would have been like calling it a fight. This was a cull.

 

Harry had let his stag fade finally when the last dementors had started to ignore the target of their hunt and focussed entirely on Gaara. He collapsed onto the ground and was unconscious soon after.

 

Snape joined him on the ground a few minutes later, clinging onto the waking world in case another threat to his detestable students arose that he needed to head off.

 

Gaara finished off the last of the dementors in the area with no sense of finality. He simply ran out.

 

After there were no more for him to kill, he and his sand flew back to the castle to go and find his soulless friend.

 

He arrived where Draco had been only to find Aurors swarming the area, chasing away the handful of dementors that had escaped his purge. The humans regarded him with instant suspicion as he landed, pointing their wands rather threateningly towards him.

 

“Identify yourself!” One of them in the lead shouted. “Now!”

 

Gaara might have killed these men too, his bloodlust still boiling away, had he not spotted them carrying Draco into the castle. Granted, this might have sent him in a homicidal massacre had he not seen the blanket and Madame Pomfrey stood at the castle gate. If Draco were dead, or soulless, they wouldn’t have bothered.

 

Gaara knew that moving his sand would just result in a time-wasting fire fight with these men, so he slowly pointed behind them to Draco.

 

Only one of them looked, after exchanging looks from sideways glances with his colleague. Obviously they didn’t trust Gaara and thought he was trying to pull a fast one. When the Auror saw it was Draco Gaara was pointing at, he seemed to clock on.

 

“You want to know if he’s alive?”

 

Gaara nodded, urgently.

 

“Well, he’s not fine, I wouldn’t say, but he’ll live. He came _this_ close to getting the Kiss performed on him, so he’ll not be up to much for the next couple of days.”

 

Gaara actually sagged a little, falling back into the sand with relief. The Aurors were less wary of the strange boy now, cloaked in sand, standing on a floating stone platform and surrounded by more of the same sand.

 

Gaara turned around, heedless of the grown men trying to order him to dismount and come with them. Instead, he searched for his clothes that Draco had dropped next to his gourd. Secluding himself inside of his sand, he got dressed.

 

While he did this, his sphere floated higher and went right over the Aurors’ heads and towards the castle. They tried sending stunners and other non-lethal spells to stop the mysterious teenager, but the most they did was loosen some of the sand shielding him, which was immediately replaced.

 

His protective sphere flew straight up and over the courtyard. He descended, and by that time he had managed to dress fully, if a little sloppily. His tie wasn’t tied and Draco hadn’t brought him any shoes, only socks. The time it had taken also gave the Aurors guarding the school time to spread word about this strange boy appearing and ignoring them and their orders (and spells.)

 

The other Aurors who had gone to liaise with the Hogwarts staff and check to make sure none of the students had been too adversely affected by the dementors proximity, had quickly heard fantastical tales of how one boy, a student at the school, had single-handedly killed every dementors stationed around Hogwarts in a matter of minutes. They had written this off as a group delusion since there was simply no way it could be true.

 

It was impossible.

 

And then the boy appeared, exhibiting his abilities, and somehow it seemed a little farfetched.

 

As many as had been able to assemble in the courtyard from where they had originally been stationed gathered, ready to face whatever the truth behind the legend might be.

 

The sand fell down into rivulets in a mesmerising dance and Gaara, sans shoes, stepped onto the chilly stones of the school courtyard amidst the flowing stone. He noticed the angry-looking men pointing their wands at him, but he didn’t really have the time or the inclination to kill them all right now. Ten minutes ago, he would have delighted in crushing them one by one.

 

It was alarming for him to acknowledge how close he was to going back to his old ways. One dead friend.

 

Still, Draco was alive, even Shukaku was (somewhat) sated with the killing of hundreds upon hundreds of dementors, and Gaara was too tired to be throwing grown men around for no good reason.

 

He put his hands up and tried not to look threatening. His sand, the smallest legible amount he could muster, wrote out: ‘I am a student. I am going inside to see my friend. Do not attack.’

 

He walked onwards, heedless of the commands to stand still or to surrender from the armed men and women. He hoped they wouldn’t start something. As it was, there would definitely be questions for him about his abilities after he killed the dementors, since the wizards seemed incapable of it themselves. He didn’t need them turning on him as an enemy because of a few stupid Aurors.

 

As he passed through the threshold and into the castle, appreciating the warmth, he saw another group of Aurors waiting with their wands raised and outstretched towards him. Perhaps he should just see if he could snatch their wands instead of tossing them about or killing them?

 

He might have done so when they started glancing at each other in between orders for him to stop, clearly considering attacking when he ignored them, but there were dozens of students all crowded on the main staircase, presumably being led to the Great Hall to be checked over and kept safe and grouped together. He didn’t want to get innocent children caught up in his (pointless) fight.

 

“Leave him alone!” Cried a voice from amongst the crowd.

 

“Yeah, leave him alone!” Came another.

 

Once they got going, a large proportion of the students on the stairs all started up shouting.

 

“He’s the one who saved us!”

 

“Where were you lot when the dementors were attacking!?”

 

“He’s a student, don’t attack!”

 

With the barefoot, diminutive and unresisting boy being vouched for by all of the children present as well as the accompanying Divinations professor who had been with them during the crisis, the Aurors had no choice but to stand down for the moment.

 

“Don’t attack!” The watch commander ordered. “Let him through. Perkins, Aljoy, you two go with him. Keep an eye out, okay?”

 

The two stepped away from the other Aurors and walked sedately behind Gaara, their wands down but not re-sheathed. The trio climbed the stairs and Gaara had to shift and dodge people trying to pat him on the back or the head, and then there were the huggers…

 

He had not saved any of them, he had just killed the dementors. The saving business was just a nasty side-effect. How could he find value in a human life when they insisted on trying to hug him?!

 

Fortunately, after the first few lining the stairs had been dodged, the Aurors stepped up and started them moving towards the Great Hall again while Gaara’s escorts stopped anymore from getting too close to him.

 

Trelawney was probably supposed to be helping guide the students, but she had found herself being herded along with them, looking rather confused about all of this. She kept trying to assure those around her that she _had_ seen all this coming but hadn’t bothered telling anyone because everything would be fine in the end. As they often did, the upper years humoured her.

 

Gaara continued up the castle, passing another group on the way, comprised on Gryffindors this time, all quick to follow the Ravenclaws’ lead and thank Gaara as loudly and as cloyingly as they could, to his dismay. He managed to dodge them as he had their predecessors and continued on his way. He didn’t pay his escorts any mind when they got caught in the throng and had to struggle through the crowd to catch up with him.

 

When he got to the Hospital Wing, he heard the chaos before he saw it.  It was mostly from the seventh years scrambling around trying to get Pepper-Up potions and chocolate to the students who had been worst hit by the dementors effects. Stepping in to the infirmary, he wasn’t spared a second glance by the busy people. The only thing they were looking out for were more affected students.

 

He walked on past those still conscious, lined up along the walls, sitting against them, clutching their hot chocolates and chocolate bars like lifelines, and to the victims that were unconscious either from their attacks or because Madam Pomfrey had deemed they were safer asleep for the time being.

 

That sort of proximity to dementors could and did drive many fully gown (criminal) adults insane in Azkaban. A child with a softer mind stood no chance when confronted as the school had been, so she would keep them asleep and dreamless until St Mungos could send over a few of their mind healers to try to reverse some of the damage.

 

One of the most severe cases was most certainly Draco Malfoy (of all people) who had been caught outside during the attack, for what reason, Poppy would never know. It had all started before the sun was up and Draco had been standing out in the grounds! He was lucky his soul had not been eaten entirely.

 

As it was, the boy was unconscious and would likely not wake for a day or two, and then he would suffer what Poppy had heard described as the ‘mother of all hangovers.’ And then there would be the nightmares and the trauma.

 

The poor boy would be in quite the state for the next week, she imagined. He would be lucky not to remember any of it by the time the mind healers were finished with him.

 

She glimpsed Gaara passing by out of the corner of her eye, but since he was walking and looking not to be crying, he was a lesser priority than everyone else in her ward at the moment. Taking a quick look over at him after he had passed, she noticed he was barefoot but otherwise unharmed, if a little tired. Just here to see his friend, Draco, then.

 

There weren’t supposed to be any visitors at the moment, but Gaara wasn’t likely to cause a ruckus. Then again, the perpetually quiet boy wasn’t usually being followed by Aurors.

 

Poor lad.

 

Gaara found Draco, along with a few other motionless students, at the back of the Hospital Wing, next to Pomfrey’s office. Gaara sat at Draco’s bedside and waited. Oddly enough, he didn’t feel like reading to pass the time right now.

 

The Aurors watched him stoically for half an hour before Madam Pomfrey, who had tended to both of them in years gone by when they had been Hogwarts students themselves, harangued them into service. She could ignore Gaara (after having him put on an extra pair of woollen socks she kept around) since he had apparently saved all of their souls earlier that morning, according to the varying reports she had received from her conscious charges. She didn’t know how much of it had been true, of course, but she couldn’t very well harass the ‘ _Protector of Hogwarts_ ’.

 

However, two layabout Aurors most definitely _could_ help around here! She didn’t care what ‘orders’ they had been issued or who was a ‘threat’. So she had them carting students around, and serving out potions and chocolates, instead of watching a fifteen year old while the said teenager watched his blond friend sleep.

 

Luckily, no matter how long a student had been out of Hogwarts, they couldn’t shake the instinctive fear of their school medi-witch.

 

When she got a moment’s respite, since all of the affected students had been brought in and they were starting to be released, she spared a second to tell Gaara the news. It was a pleasure to tell him since she knew just how unpleasant it was going to be informing Lucius and Narcissa later on.

 

“He won’t be waking up any time soon, I’m afraid, Gaara. His soul was returned to his body not long after it was distracted, I would say, so very little damage was done. He’ll wake up in a few days and then he will need to see a specialist. You’re not hurt are you?”

 

Gaara turned to her when she asked after his safety. It never ceased to amaze him when people would show concern for his health. He shook his head but let a small smile grace his lips momentarily, as thanks, before letting it slip back off and turning back to Draco.

 

At least he knew Draco wasn’t going anywhere any time soon.

 

Outside of the Hospital Wing, the Hallways were empty but for the handful of Aurors still patrolling. Over the hour that they had been there, they had managed to round up around thirty dementor stragglers that had been left after the slaughter, and they had found what was left of the wranglers that had been stationed around the grounds to control the dementors. They had been caught in the frenzy and the dementors had overcome their defences and Kissed them all.

 

The students had all been located and moved to the Great Hall to have breakfast and try and calm down. The professors present were left to try to explain what had happened and wait for the pandemonium that would occur as soon as the Ministry, the press or the parents caught wind of what had happened. They were also waiting for their venerable leader to return from his strategy meeting with the Minister, ironically concerning the presence of the dementors.

 

They were also trying to hide their panic because a few notable people were missing during their headcount. Severus Snape, Remus Lupin, Harry Potter, Ronald Weasley, and Hermione Granger had not shown up anywhere they should have been. The teachers, headed by Professor Sprout, had quashed any rumours of speculation about the conspicuous absences, saying the five were elsewhere being seen to or helping the Aurors.

 

The Slytherins were the most suspicious, as they were so inclined, by their missing Head of House. They had understood about Malfoy being in the Hospital Wing with Gaara (the only Slytherins caught outside of the dormitories that morning), but they couldn’t accept that Snape hadn’t seen fit to come and check on them once. Even if he was helping the Aurors clear out the last of the dementors, there was no way he wouldn’t even look in on them.

 

He was an odd grump that way.

 

In the infirmary, just as the worst of the disorder had been quelled and the majority of the low risk cases had been treated the only way they could be, Poppy’s headache quadrupled as two more Aurors arrived, carrying an injured Ronald Weasley between them, and being followed by Severus, Potter and Granger, all looking weary and pale. They had clearly been closer to the swarm than she’d recommend.

 

Following the group was a third Auror and his wand was drawn.

 

Gaara looked up at the latest entrants, and his blood ran cold. In his mad worry for Draco, he hadn’t thought about Sirius. There stood Potter and his friends along with Snape. They all looked particularly upset and they were being guarded closely by an Auror.

 

Gaara listened in closely to what was happening from that point on. He would have liked to go on over and ask what had happened to Sirius plainly, but since Snape hated him and the three teenagers most likely had no reason to trust him enough to share the truth with him, he didn’t expect it would get him anywhere.

 

He got the information he needed, sadly, when he heard one of the Aurors that was supposed to be watching him relay what he had heard from the Golden Trio’s watchdog: that Sirius Black had been captured with them, but that Harry Potter of all people had tried fighting off the arresting Aurors, hence the ‘guard’.

 

Black had somehow brainwashed the children into believing he had been framed or something, so they had to be restrained whilst Black was taken into custody. Black, for his part, had enacted his right not to make a statement upon his arrest (mostly because he wasn’t conscious), and had been taken to the Dungeons until they got clearance to transport him to the Ministry cells.

 

They couldn’t follow the Minister’s directive to have Black kissed after what had happened earlier.

 

Somehow, Snape had been credited with the capture (probably since he was an adult close by and wasn’t making a fuss over Sirius’ innocence). Gaara assumed Snape was keeping his mouth shut even though he had to know by now that Sirius was innocent, because of Sirius’ past misdeeds and because Snape was an ass.

 

Snape, in truth, had elected to remain quiet since his word would mean absolutely nothing in the matter and he would likely be accused of colluding with Voldemort’s “right hand man”, which would make his life much more difficult than it already was.

 

Like most of the people in the castle, Severus was waiting for the Headmaster to return so that they might straighten things out.

 

There was more activity and eventually three new Aurors relieved the ones in the Hospital Wing. These three couldn’t stop themselves from staring as soon as they caught sight of Gaara. They had been among the Aurors assigned to questioning the staff and the students for the past hour and the consensus had been that, in varyingly dramatic or underplayed narratives, Gaara had somehow called upon unbelievable magic and destroyed all of the dementors with brute force.

 

It was said that Dumbledore and some highly skilled duellists had been known to kill dementors, the former even dispatching as many as twenty in the fifties in the last known dementor attack on Muggles. He had enchanted a dozen spears from the local castle attraction and managed to kill the group. He had explained at the Statute of Secrecy hearing that he would have used the Patronus Charm, in which he was expertly proficient, but it would have simply driven the dementors away. They would have scattered and it would have taken weeks and the Kissing of hundreds more people before the Ministry managed to get them all back under control.

 

No one wanted to say it, but it was in the back of their minds that this child was not just some freakish prodigy. To be able to enact feats even the greatest wizard of all time might not be able to…

 

They came to the same conclusion so many other adults had come to: Gaara was a monster.

 

The students, on the other hand, were undaunted by his powers. They now all saw him as the boy who had saved them from a fate worse than death.

 

A fate that had been caused by the Ministry’s mistake.

 

When Gaara finally looked up at the silent Auror sentinels, they quickly averted their eyes, as if it would be impossible to tell they had been rudely staring moments before. Gaara looked on at them for a few seconds, before returning to staring into space.

 

“Did you hear about Black?” One of them whispered to the other.

 

“Do you think there’s anyone in the castle that hasn’t heard about his capture yet, Alan?”

 

“No, not that. They finally managed to get a hold of Fudge and he sent word ahead that we have to keep him secure and they’ll move him tomorrow. They’re gonna have him Kissed on Sunday.”

 

“They’re still gonna go ahead and Kiss him? After this? Wow…”

 

“Yeah. I don’t know how they’re going to explain this all to the papers, but I suppose showing the dementors actually doing their job might help.”

 

“That’d explain why they’re doing it in three days time.”

 

“So, since Fudge is out of his meeting or whatever, does that mean we’re all going to Azkaban ourselves now?”

 

“Nah. We’ll get told off, the Commander will probably get suspended for a couple weeks with pay, and then they’ll pretend this never happened.”

 

“Sweet.”

 

“What do you reckon they’re gonna do with him?” One said, nodding over his shoulder to where Gaara had been sitting since he arrived.

 

“Who knows…” He muttered, looking over at the boy, only to find his chair empty. “Where did he go?”

 

“Hmm?”

 

“The boy, he’s gone.” He said, not worried. He assumed the teen had wandered over to the bathroom or to check on another of his schoolmates.

 

“We should get eyes on him. If he wanders too far, Fudge and his lot might get here before we find him again. I don’t want that sort of attention today.”

 

The pair started to shuffle around the cots and the hospital beds, looking for the distinctive red hair. The stumbled across a Weasley or two before they concluded he wasn’t there. They started to panic when he wasn’t in the Hospital Wing, but they tried not to let on to their colleague watching over the Boy-Who-Lived and his friends.

 

If they let this Gaara kid escape, they’d be the laughing stock of their unit for weeks.

 

They tried the toilet but it was empty, and the massive door hadn’t been opened in a while, so he hadn’t gone out that way.

 

“Excuse me, matron, have you seen Gaara?”

 

Madam Pomfrey looked around, pointedly at Draco’s bedside, but turned and shook her head, “I’m afraid not. He does tend to disappear sometimes. He’ll show up sooner or later, I’m sure.”

 

Her assurance didn’t have the comforting effect intended.

 

“Ah, shit.”

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

The Aurors who had been ordered to stay at the Ministry had, after hours and countless spells, managed to get the Ministry Meeting Room doors open. They hadn’t managed to crack the warding; that would have taken even a team of Gringotts’ ward specialists hours longer, but they had managed to make enough noise to get the Minister’s attention.

 

Inside of the room, the participants had all been flagging. Even Fudge, who had been determined for hour upon hour to power through the tedium and the ridiculousness until they achieved something by pure force of will, ended up slumped in his chair, occasionally batting away requests to break up the meeting for the night and reconvene later.

 

Dumbledore fell asleep sometime after four in the morning, his age catching up with him, and Minerva wasn’t far behind. Fillius succumbed hours ago, having nothing constructive to add. Lucius didn’t look at all dishevelled, beyond the noticeable bags under his eyes, but his witty retorts had dulled as the meeting wore on.

 

Morbidus might have just shown up for all the lethargy he was displaying. He seemed to constantly find new ways to unnerve the people around him.

 

Sutherland, Barnett and Bones were the main driving force for the meeting after Fudge’s carefully laid out itinerary was thrown out of the entirely metaphorical window. They had taken to discussing the complex logistics of protecting the castle from Black who was a real threat and had displayed the ability to bypass the dementors at will.

 

The issue was that they hadn’t been able to agree on any one single issue, other than that there _was_ an issue.

 

Some proposed solutions had been: increasing the number of dementors, moving them closer to the castle, reducing the number of dementors by a small amount, replacing them with Aurors, replacing them with a new branch of Ministry security, replacing them with Goblins, offering Black amnesty, activating further wards around the castle, releasing magical creatures into the grounds to keep him out, removing Potter from the school to a secure location… And the list went on with even sillier ideas.

 

All of them were deemed to be too expensive, ineffective, or more dangerous than Black himself. And all through, there had been squabbles about whose job it was to stop Black or to foot the bill, or who was to blame for his escape in the first place.

 

Then there were issues of public relations, and then there were discussions of the teaching staff at Hogwarts and how they were dealing with the difficulties. Lucius spearheaded this transparent attempt to steer the conversation towards impeaching Dumbledore again.

 

Needless to say, it had been too much of a stretch to blame the Headmaster for the problems this time around, and Morbidus had even been called by Fudge to support this by giving a frank and rather positive assessment of the school from his inspection.

 

Most present knew that it had been a ruse, even if they didn’t know why Morbidus had been inspecting the school exactly.

 

It was shortly after the attack on Hogwarts had been fended off, hundreds of miles away, that Albus had gone to sleep.

 

Fudge, by three in the morning, looked miserable, wanting nothing more than to call off this farce and try something else, but he knew it would be leaked to the Prophet that the meeting had taken place and from there he would be speared by public opinion.

 

‘Fudge Fails Again!’ He could see the headlines now.

 

It was at perhaps six in the morning, after the sun must have risen, that Fudge heard a dull thud coming from outside. Working in the Ministry of Magic for as long as he had, he had come to expect such bangs and thuds from outside of his office.

 

It was the better part of an hour later that it occurred to Fudge that he wasn’t _in his_ office at the moment, he was in **hell** , and this particular hell was entirely soundproof. This realisation came after a particularly loud bang shook the door a little, alerting everyone else in the room to it.

 

Every conscious person jumped on the excuse to break up the meeting, except Morbidus, while Minerva started trying to wake up her boss and mentor, who was a surprisingly deep sleeper.

 

The ensuing five minutes blurred by for the sleep deprived officials as the Meeting Room was stormed by a dozen haggard Aurors who started relaying the terrifying story unfolding at Hogwarts.

 

Minerva went weak in the knees and had to lean on Lucius Malfoy of all people when she heard about the wholesale dementor attack on the castle. Albus only took one short breath, and then he was straight on to crisis management alongside Morbidus, who was filling in for Fudge and Lucius, both of whom were still frozen. The former because of his indisposition to high stress situations and crises, and the latter because of the immediate connection his mind drew between this attack and where his son was.

 

Amelia Bones, Rufus Scrimgeour and Derek Sutherland also ran to the floos to get to the castle and help. Mr Sutherland, hearing along the way about how the dementors had run wild and that the other wranglers hadn’t shown up, causing him to worry even though he knew exactly what had happened. His men had all been Kissed.

 

This was the busiest the Ministry had been before nine in the morning since November 1st 1981, and the halls were not filled with celebrations or tears of joy this time. Instead, this morning, the hallways were abuzz with panic and fear. A good number of the men and women running around had children, or nieces or nephews or grandchildren or brothers or sisters at Hogwarts, and word had inevitably spread that the dementors guarding the castle had attacked the school, and the Aurors had only been deployed after the fact.

 

The fervour slowed to a stop when people caught sight of the key people for handling this issue, namely those who had been sealed tightly in a meeting all night.

 

Morbidus didn’t pause when the crowds began rushing towards Fudge and Dumbledore, slipping through the mass and continuing to his office to get his own staff running properly. There was a lot to be done and a great deal of it needed to be finished before any of these simpletons worked out who was to blame. Henrick had invested far too much time in managing Fudge to let him trip himself out of office.

 

And now that he had finally ousted Dumbledore from the inner circle too...

 

Albus gritted his remaining teeth when the crowd blocked his way, so he sent Minerva and Fillius on with Amelia and Mr Sutherland while he dealt with the panicked relatives. His job was going to involve a lot of that in the next few weeks. He also did them the courtesy of unlocking Hogwarts’ floos to them.

 

“Please, everyone, stay calm!” He called, gathering every eye’s attention instantly.

 

Fudge looked also, upset that the centenarian was taller than him and had managed to take charge even now, ignoring the Minister for Magic entirely.

 

He needed to be seen to do something!

 

Minerva and Fillius were almost running by the time they got to the Floo corridor, followed by Ms Bones and the dementor wrangler. They had no idea what the state of their precious school or the children would be when they got there. The reports they had heard in the initial breach had been spotty and inconsistent, and had some strange variances.

 

Some of the earlier stories talked about the dementors swarming and no one being able to fend them off, and then the newest ones just coming in said that the dementors were all gone.

 

When they arrived, directly into Fillius’ office, the walls were still standing, the windows were still intact, and the fire warmed the stone room from the Scottish morning chill. It was anticlimactic to say the least.

 

The halls were empty as they made their way down to the Great Hall, all the while on the lookout for soulless bodies or stray dementors. By the time they got to the ground floor of the castle, they almost didn’t believe what the frantic Aurors had told them. There was no sign of battle, no bodies, no panicking students, it was as if nothing at all had happened and the students were still sound asleep in their dormitories.

 

That notion was dispelled when they entered the Great Hall and witnessed the chaos within. The tables were nowhere to be seen, and once again the entire student body had been relocated there following a breach of the castle. Second time in a year…

 

However, unlike last time and contrary to expectations, the student were not frightened, they were excited beyond control. The distinctly-robed Aurors were stood to the side with a handful of Slytherin upper years, taking notes about something, while the rest of the vast student body were being corralled by the overwhelmed teachers.

 

Minerva wasn’t going to stand for this!

 

She strode through the children, quieting every one that saw her, and when she got to the head of the Hall, she sent out a bang from her wand, silencing the ruckus, and then amplified her voice.

 

“Quiet down at once! Headmaster Dumbledore, Professor Flitwick and I have been informed of the situation. No students or teachers have been seriously hurt, so there is no need to panic. Classes will be cancelled for today at least, and everyone here will stay in the Hall while the Ministry Aurors complete their search of the castle. Your parents have been or will be informed soon and the morning post will be here shortly.”

 

Stepping down, Minerva took a deep breath and said, aside, to Fillius, “We will need to have the tables put back so the students can have their breakfast. It would help if we knew when Albus will be getting here.”

 

“You’re doing fine, Minerva. Let’s just keep everyone calm and fed for the time being, and hopefully Severus will show up soon and take care of his Slytherins. We’ll have to split ‘Puffs and Slytherins until then. Pomona looks about ready to drop.”

 

“Yes, poor dear. I believe it was her turn to patrol last night and then to have to fight off however many dementors in the morning…” Fillius went quiet.

 

“I’ll help her up to the Hospital Wing where she can get some rest. At least we know it’s clear in there.”

 

 McGonagall walked over to the Head of Hufflepuff, leaning against the wall and watching vigilantly over her precious students and not just her House.

 

“Pomona, you need to take a break. You can’t have slept more than an hour or two.” McGonagall whispered.

 

“Oh hush now. You look like you slept even less than I did last night. I’ll wander off and take a nap when you do!”

 

“ _I_ didn’t have to fend off hundreds of hungry dementors this morning. You’re exhausted. Which do you think will upset the children more: you going to see Poppy and having a little sleep, or collapsing in front of them and being levitated there?”

 

Sprout looked at the Deputy Headmistress and sighed, knowing her headstrong colleague wouldn’t let her continue in this state. She supposed it would be best if she did go and lie down for a minute. Minerva and Fillius would crash around lunchtime if they hadn’t had any sleep either. It was set to be a long day and none of them were young enough to be doing all-nighters anymore, except their absentee Potions master. He had no excuse.

 

When they got to the school infirmary, the Heads of House found out the unabridged story from Harry Potter, since Snape was still asleep, Granger was by Weasley’s bedside and the ginger was unconscious. Potter relayed the entire night’s events from chasing Scabbers, to being trapped by Sirius, to finding out about the switch, to Lupin’s transformation, and the dementor attack.

 

As he went on, Harry wondered whether, if being an Auror or professional Quidditch player didn’t work out, he might have a future in storytelling. Then he remembered the other famous storyteller he had met and decided being anything like Lockhart was not a good life goal, even if he happened to tell the truth.

                          

When he came to the finale, of which the professors had only heard rumours, he explained in as much detail as he was possible how Gaara had flown overheard and sent his flood of sand to destroy all of the dementors. It took some pretty firm insistences on Harry’s part before the adults would accept that Gaara had been able to accomplish what he had accomplished.

 

That line of enquiry had naturally led to the question, where was Gaara now? Amelia Bones had shown up wanting to question the red-head too, but the Aurors supposedly guarding him reported that he had given them the slip. While Bones chewed out her incompetent subordinates, McGonagall left Pomona to try (and fail) to get some rest amongst their injured students while she went back to the Great Hall to keep an eye on everyone else and await Albus’ return.

 

Snape had been given a rude awakening and was dragged away by Minerva as she chastised his faltering constitution.

 

The Aurors were beginning to thin out in the castle, a great number of them having descended to the Dungeons to watch Black’s unconscious body to make sure it didn’t escape in the same mysterious manner the awake convict had done.

 

When the Minister and Dumbledore arrived, they quickly went to work barking unnecessary orders in front of the reporters they had invited, and calming the students, respectively. Albus had been briefed on all of the pertinent information alongside Cornelius. Albus had not been as surprised as others to hear Severus had a hand in Sirius’ capture. Their childhood rivalry was bound to overcome any lingering loyalties the Ministry suspected Severus still held for Black’s cause.

 

Although, if Black’s ultimate goal truly was to kill Harry Potter, they would do better not to ask what Severus thought on the matter.

 

Nonetheless, he was quick to join the Minister in applauding the capture, doubly so when he heard that three of his students had been involved in the misadventure and had come out of it with nothing more serious than a broken ankle. A miracle, all things considered.

 

The school was unharmed; his students were all safe, for the most part. Those who had been worst hit by the dementors would recover in a week or two. Mr Weasley would be walking again by dinnertime, if Poppy was feeling generous.

 

And poor, misguided Sirius would be given the worst possible punishment for his crimes.

 

There were just a few details he needed to clarify. He, like everybody else, was very interested in the vital role Gaara had played in the conclusion, as well as the reports of Harry fighting his Auror rescuers.

 

Fortunately, Minerva cleared things up in the most terrible of ways. He didn’t know what he would do without his deputy in times like these. She told him how Sirius was unverifiably innocent and that no matter what anybody said, Aurors would not listen. Albus knew all too well there was nothing to be done without some independent evidence.

 

Still, with such a grave injustice still ongoing, he did try to reason with Cornelius, try to buy some time to belatedly investigate matters further. The Minister for Magic had replied in the voice of his office that Sirius Black was unequivocally guilty and _would_ be Kissed three days hence, with no stay permitted.

 

They hadn’t spoken since, and Albus doubted they would before Cornelius returned to the Ministry in a few hours. Severus would likely try as well, no matter the animosity between him and Sirius, to intercede on his behalf while the Minister paraded him around as the man who caught Sirius Black. It was a small comfort in this dark time that Severus was undoubtedly immensely uncomfortable with all of this attention.

 

The only reason the boy would allow it was because he would be getting an Order of Merlin for his heroic deeds. First Class, too, Albus imagined.

 

The Ministry had made their statements earlier in the morning, and had someone answering the diminishing questions every hour in the Ministry Foyer. The headline from the Ministry had been Sirius Black’s capture, followed by who had done it, that no one had been seriously hurt in the incident. And finally they mentioned that some of the dementors guarding the school had escaped their watchers’ control briefly but no students or professors had been seriously hurt in the scuffle and the problem had resolved itself promptly.

 

The papers had relegated the attack to the third page but had accused the Ministry of underplaying the severity of the attack when it became clear from the number of owls from angry parents just how massive the attack had been. Even still, the entire front page was engulfed by the headline: ‘Sirius Black Captured at Hogwarts!’

 

The Kissing of the wranglers stationed at Hogwarts was not mentioned in the entire paper, and would only be reported the day after, following the preliminary results of the report into the incident, as well as the few family members of the men coming forward.

 

The morning post delivery had been tremendous, just as they had been moving the tables back into place so the students could start their late breakfast. Nearly every student had received at least one piece of mail.

 

After Ron Weasley had received half a dozen from his distraught mother (and one from his mischievous twin brothers who had sent it from the Great Hall and included a number of very embarrassing adulations for their heroic and hurt ‘widdle baby bwother’), Madam Pomfrey had banned any further such deliveries.

 

She was then in half a mind to ban visitors when Lucius Malfoy, using his Ministry credentials to bypass the blockade of Aurors preventing other such worried parents from rushing into the castle, barged into the Hospital Wing and made an ungodly ruckus about his son. It took her ten valuable minutes to explain Draco’s condition and that there was nothing his money could buy that would hasten or ease the boy’s recovery except some peace and quiet, which was entirely free.

 

She told him as such, as she had when he had been a student at the school and had made similar attempts to bribe her. Her exact words had been the same as then: “Mr Malfoy, put your purse away. I don’t care what family you’re from, don’t make a fuss in my offices.”

 

His reaction was mirrored as well: he shook with impotent rage and sat down.

 

By mid-afternoon, a semblance of order had been restored to the castle. The Aurors had all retreated to the Dungeons to watch over Black, sure an escape attempt was imminent.

 

The students able to, had been moved from the infirmary to the Great Hall, and those not able were recovering as expected and would be good to go the next day.

 

Gaara had still not been sighted despite multiple searches in the castle and through the grounds, and Dumbledore had called his staff off of the task knowing that the boy would be found only when he wished to be. He spent a good deal of time that day thinking about Gaara and what he meant.

 

He had taken the time to speak with Harry and his friends before they rejoined their schoolmates, to ask them to keep their peace rather than make a fuss about their involvement and Sirius’ freedom. It would no doubt cause a panic and gather a lot of attention, but the Minister would discredit them with talk of mind magics before they could affect any change.

 

Worse yet, any political capital Harry might have in his name would forever be tarnished by the accusations and he would struggle to regain the public’s trust.

 

Of course, Harry and Ronald wanted to go ahead and make their protest, or even try to break Sirius out themselves. Albus wished he had some daring plan of his own, but he couldn’t imagine a way to free Sirius in just three days. Any legal manoeuvre would take a week, and any illegal ones would cost both his people and the aurors a number of lives.

 

All he could do was hope for a miracle and continue to beseech Fudge to see reason and delay this hasty action.

 

It pained him to let his precious students see his weakness in their time of dire need.

 

Severus had been released from Fudge’s grasp and was recovering among his snakes in the Great Hall, scaring away all eager questions that might be asked of him or his ‘heroic endeavours’. Albus hadn’t even had to ask for the man’s silence. Then again, Severus knew if he made the slightest mention of sympathy for Black, he would accused of conspiring with him and would be in Azkaban before his Order of Merlin had finished turning to ash.

 

Speaking of collusion… Remus…

 

Albus’ erstwhile Defence Against the Dark Arts professor had finally recovered from his night’s activities and resurfaced in his office, dressed and looking as haggard as expected. Albus wasn’t entirely sure how Remus had gotten back into the castle, but he would concern himself with the Marauders ongoing secrets another time. First he had to give the grown man a telling off, and then thank him for providing their students with a role model.

 

He then heard some more of the story of Remus’ conspiracy with Sirius, but Lupin refused to reveal anything about Gaara that Albus didn’t already know. If he thought Remus knew anything of pertinence or significance, he might have pressed the issue further, but the headmaster had the impression that even to friends, Gaara was a mystery unto himself.

 

That said, he wouldn’t mind speaking with Draco Malfoy when the boy awoke.

 

Eventually, with the students growing restless, they were released back into the castle but forbidden from entering the Dungeons, with wards and guards posted to stop the more curious from inevitably ignoring the rule. This restriction of course meant that Slytherin had been singled out to remain barred from returning to their House, and they were, as expected, very vocal about this infringement of their rights.

 

When the Golden Trio returned to the populace, they were bothered with questions even more than Professor Snape, but their reaction was uncannily similar, all three being very upset by their inability to speak out against the injustice and snarling at those who asked questions like ‘Was Sirius Black crying when they took him away?’ or ‘Did you manage to curse him before Snape got there?’ and worse.

 

Those around them simply assumed they were traumatised by the experience, or getting big heads because of their minor role in the capture.

 

By dinnertime, the excitement had dimmed, but certainly not disappeared. New stories were still flooding in, from Fudge sacking his Head of the Department of Magical Punishment and Sentencing for his bungling of the Hogwarts protection, to the scandalous refusal of the Ministry to allow parents to immediately retrieve their own children from the school. With the unrest not abating, and many of the older students arguing about or attempting to leave the castle at the beckoning of their parents, Dumbledore addressed the students again before dinner was served, to help clear up some of the day’s events and the future of the school.

 

“Good evening. It has been a long day and I am sure I can speak for everyone when I say it has been a tiring one too, so I will not speak overlong and soon we can enjoy our dinners and get some rest. This morning, Sirius Black was captured in the grounds of our school by one of our professors as well as Ministry Aurors. At the same time, the dementors sent to guard you all from Mr Black ran amok and attacked the castle. You all saw them, a great many of you felt their terrible effects. They were repelled and will never return to this castle so long as I am Headmaster.

 

“Sirius Black is being held in our Dungeons until he can be transferred to the Ministry tomorrow, where he will stay until his…punishment is carried out. Tonight, you may all return to your dormitories except for Slytherin who will have to remain the Great Hall for the night.

 

“Your parents, as you will know, have been notified of what has happened and many have expressed a desire to collect you from school early. With your exams being complete, we will begin making arrangements for those whose parents who wish to collect their child early may do so after tomorrow. The rest will stay here and classes will return to normal.

 

“This year has presented us all with unforeseen dangers and challenges to overcome, but all of you have risen to these dangers in your own ways. It has been a challenging year for everyone, but in all the years this castle has housed children yearning to develop their potentials, I don’t imagine there has been a single one that has felt any less than entirely too much for them to handle. It is natural to feel the pressures of current events as well as your own lives, but always remember that help from those around us can help us to overcome any obstacle.

 

“Now, I am famished and I hope you will all join me in raising a toast to our professors and students who heroically defended our castle this morning from the dreaded dementors. Cheers.”

 

“Cheers!” The chorus rang out.

 

The Slytherins were a little put out that their House’s contribution had not been mentioned since their Head had captured Sirius Black, and their… much loved transfer had defeated the dementors. Somehow.

 

The Hospital Wing that night had almost emptied, and those most affected by the dementors who were still forced to remain under Madam Pomfrey’s care had been given special dispensation for their parents to visit them. The only ones yet to regain consciousness were Draco and a seventh-year Gryffindor who had been in the halls when the dementors first broke through. By the time the professors managed to get to him, his soul was almost eaten.

 

By Draco’s bedside, Lucius was still set, sitting perfectly upright and trying to look like his son’s state didn’t bother him, even though he hadn’t budged in four hours. Narcissa, while still retaining her poise, could not hide her concern as fully and was clutching her son’s deathly pale hand and wishing she had paid more attention in her Potions and Healing classes instead of preparing for married life when she was at school, then she might be able to help Draco.

 

She had asked after Gaara, as an afterthought, but apparently he had run off, to everyone’s dismay since he seemed to have been instrumental in protecting the school.

 

In her lament, praying to whatever she had left to believe in that her baby would be okay, she also considered how best she could raise the subject of taking Gaara in as a ward to her husband. Then again, with this latest display of power and ability to protect their heir, it wouldn’t be too difficult to argue for Gaara’s usefulness.

 

After dinner, Lupin called Harry, Ron and Hermione in to his office to discuss what had happened more fully and what their next plan was, but they were left with no further plans to rescue Sirius without incriminating themselves. Remus cried himself to sleep that night for the first time in years.

 

It hadn’t been as long for Harry, but his hope of family being snatched away so abruptly was enough to send him back to his all too familiar emotional turmoil.

 

Sirius didn’t wake up that night, and his dreams were as horrendous as they had been in Azkaban, the remnants of the dementors effects still working their way out of his system after his close brush with the swarm.

 

And in the Ministry of Magic, after an afternoon nap to keep him alert into the evening, Fudge was conferring with Morbidus on the results of his investigation.

 

“What do we knew about him?”

 

“In a word Minister, nothing. He appeared out of nowhere, and there are no records of him or his entry into this country. The records I _was_ able to procure from the school do not list a number of pertinent details, including his country of origin, family, or his surname. His relationship with the Malfoy family does not appear to mean that he follows their… interests, from what I have been told. His affiliations appear to be toward Muggle-equality rather than blood purity, but he is not an activist. Also, despite his Slytherin sorting, he spends the majority of his free time researching a number of esoteric magical subjects, though I was not able to obtain a list of his readings from the school librarian.”

 

“Yes, yes, we know all of this already. What about his abilities? He killed hundreds of dementors single-handedly. What’s to stop him from walking into the Ministry and killing all of us?!”

 

“For one, Minister, he does not have a record of starting fights in school. More importantly, his abilities, as predisposed as they are to combat, would not be insurmountable to our own combat forces. The Department of Mysteries have run a number of simulations and have reported that a number of spells would be effective against him should the need arise.” Morbidus said. “Water magics, some more powerful fire spells. His sand does not seem to be magically resistant to HeaHelemental attacks, and enough force could theoretically break any shield he conjured.”

 

“At least we can defend the heart of Magical Britain from a teenager.” Fudge bitterly commented. “So where is he now?”

 

Morbidus looked away for a moment, unable to look Fudge in the eye when he reported one of the few failures in his work, “I am afraid we have had no luck in locating Gaara since he snuck away from his assigned guards. There have been no sightings and we believe he is no longer in the castle or on the grounds of Hogwarts. I have sent two of my men to watch Malfoy manor, but I doubt he would return there, especially as all of the Malfoys are still in the school at this present moment.”

 

“Great. So we have a… whatever this boy is, wandering around Scotland. All the while, I’ll be lucky to survive the week if the press have their way.”

 

“We will continue our searching, Minister, and in the meantime we will move forward with Black’s sentencing in two days and the public will see you as the hero who stopped You-Know-Who’s top lieutenant from restarting the war.”

 

“Yes, you’re probably right. When all of this has quietened down, I’ll have to find a way of distracting everyone from this debacle. Even if they can be persuaded to focus on Black now, in a couple of months, all they’ll be able to talk about is the time _I_ almost let their children have their souls sucked out. We will need something to keep their minds occupied until the reports and investigations have all been published.” Fudge said, sitting back in his plush chair.

 

“I’m sure you will think of something, Minister.” Morbidus rasped out, before turning on his heel and walking out the door.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

“Thank you all for coming today. I would like to begin by paying tribute to the brave men who gave their lives for the capture of Sirius Black three days ago. Their sacrifices were tragic but not in vain! Our investigation is still ongoing, but there have been suggestions that Sirius Black was behind the now-infamous Hogwarts Attack. Regardless, no matter what Black has done or how he tried to cover up his involvement, the important thing to remember is that those thirty men died for their Ministry and for our children.”

 

“Minister Fudge, wasn’t it thirty-four dementor wranglers?”

 

“Didn’t their chief, Derek Sutherland argue against the assigning of that many dementors to Hogwarts?”

 

“No questions!” Fudge screamed into his microphone. “Please… no questions at this time.” He took a deep breath, as if trying to bide time until he remembered his next line. “There are many questions still unsolved regarding the incident at Hogwarts: what part a known Werewolf played in the assault, the reports of potentially dark magic used to repel a fifth of the dementors, rumours of the Dark Mark being cast above the castle six times, and the presence of an as-of-yet unidentified dark creature conspiring with Black and the dementors.”

 

“Minister, what do you have to say to rumours of an impeachment, pending the results of the inquiry?”

 

“Will you step down?”

 

“Who have you picked to replace you?”

 

“I said no questions!” Fudge yelled, watching as Aurors came to manhandle the reporters out of the atrium with satisfaction.

 

“Now… Today, I would also like to formally commend the efforts of Professor Severus Snape for his pivotal role in the capture of Sirius Black, working in conjunction with my men. Together, we were able to safely bring Black back into custody so that he can answer for his many crimes. Together, we have protected the children from this vile menace. Children like Harry Potter and his friends.” Fudge waved his arm towards Harry, Ron and Hermione, the latter two thirds being further insulted by Fudge forgetting their names (after having witnessed his rehearsing back stage, trying fruitlessly to remember them.) Harry was just pissed about Sirius.

 

Snape was stood by them, disliking the company almost as much as the false adulation, staring forward into space. He had been warned indirectly by Fudge’s men, sensing his reluctance to play along with the government sanctioned story, that his nefarious past was not forgotten and as much as a dirty look would not just revoke his Order of Merlin, but might see him take Black’s place in prison.

 

Harry, Hermione and Ron had been given similar, if much less severe warnings. If they spoke up and interrupted the ceremony with ‘teenage antics’ or ‘dissenting propaganda’, they might need to spend some time in St Mungo’s to see what spells Black had weaved into their delicate little minds.

 

Ron had wanted to come straight out and tell his parents, but both of them had not let him get in a word edgeways since they were allowed to see him earlier that afternoon. He had long sensed it, but now it was clear they would not accept a kind word said about the Potters’ betrayer.

 

Hermione hadn’t seen her parents, they weren’t invited to the ceremony at the Ministry; and even if they had been invited, she wouldn’t have wanted them to witness such a travesty.

 

Even if the Kissing was going to happen in a distant corner of the Ministry, this miscarriage of justice was odious no matter how far removed.

 

Dumbledore was seated behind the frontline of reporters. He was the only other professor to be invited and he hadn’t even been there for the attack…

 

He was considering whether or not speaking up just before Cornelius finished his speech would cause enough unrest to prompt a stay of execution. The reporters would join the bandwagon, anything to expose a possible Ministy blunder. The gathered politicians and Hogwarts parents and governors would probably be split, but a fair few would most likely join too…

 

But Albus would lose whatever political standing he had left on the manoeuvre if he implemented it. Fudge would be ousted if Sirius were freed this way, but he would devote his remaining days in office to removing Dumbledore from any position he held outside of Hogwarts. And the other politicians, even those who agreed with him, would never trust him after playing such a trick on the Minister for Magic. He would lose all of his allies and influence, but Sirius might be saved…

 

More importantly, Harry would not lose faith in the adults around him. Really, there was no choice but to intervene when the children were looking up to them for guidance and an example to follow.

 

The only other student who had been extended an invite had been Draco Malfoy, at his father’s insistence. It was an important event and Lucius was there as both a prominent politician and as a Hogwarts governor, Narcissa was there as his wife, and Draco was there as both his son and as a student of the attacked school.

 

Draco’s invitation had also been because Narcissa was worried about his melancholy since he awoke, with the residual effects of the dementors still working their way out of his delicate system combined with his best friend (and rescuer) having disappeared. The mood depressing effects of the dementors had put him into something of a slump and she had forced her way into visiting every day, even after he had woken up.

 

He would be going home with them the next day, after he had packed up his and Gaara’s things to be brought back to the manor.

 

Lucius’ presence was entirely for the political capital, but for Narcissa it was a little more emotional. Like Bellatrix and Andromeda, she hadn’t liked Sirius when they were young. He had always been impetuous and uncouth, even before he went to Hogwarts and became a blood-traitor. There had been talk of a marriage between them, for the usual purity reasons, but that quickly fell apart when it became clear that Sirius was not only against the match, but had no interest in their family’s honour.

 

She had lost touch, then she had been married off to a Malfoy and Sirius had turned traitor and been banished. When he had been imprisoned as a servant of the Dark Lord, she had sent him a letter in the hopes that he had rejoined their side, but he had never replied. She suspected he had been framed, as did Lucius presumably.

 

Still, as much of a brat as he had been, she hated to see the last of her old family die (or worse).

 

“Within the hour, the villainous mass-murderer, Sirius Black will be taken from his cell and will be given the dementors Kiss according the sentence handed down. His body will then be taken back to Azkaban and buried in an unmarked grave, as per tradition. Following this press conference, there will be a small celebration to mark the end of this crisis and the safety of all involved.”

 

He cleared his throat and looked to his left, away from the Golden Trio and Snape. A civil servant rushed to bring him a small decorative box, containing the Potions master’s Order of Merlin, _Second_ Class. It had been discussed, whether he might be deserving of a First Class, but with his history Fudge had declared Snape was lucky he wasn’t being hexed.

 

He couldn’t go around just _giving the things away_ , now, could he?

 

The medal was nice, but it was still noticeably less pretty than the golden First Class ones were. Snape sneered at his luck. The heroics and sacrifices he had undergone for the sake of the Light should have warranted a medal or two years ago. Instead, now, he was being awarded a prize for something he did not do to a man who did not deserve it to be done.

 

He had spent yesterday trying to think up a way Potter (junior or senior) could be to blame for this travesty. He hadn’t been able to draw up a convincing link between Potter and his current problem, but it had taken all of ten minutes after that to make a chain between Sirius Black’s problems and him through…

 

“W-what are you doing here?” Fudge yelled, looking behind the cluster of seats and standing reporters to where Gaara was standing over a broken and bloody body.

 

The Aurors guarding their leader advanced, and those at the back of the hall, who had somehow let the little red-head and grown corpse past them, followed suit. The reporters all ignored their gobsmacked Minister to take dozen of pictures of the boy wearing a giant gourd on his back that could only be the mysterious transfer student who had played a role in defeating the out of control dementors.

 

“Slowly take out your wand with your thumb and forefinger and place it on the ground, now!” One of them shouted.

 

Gaara looked over to the one who had addressed him and followed the instruction without any hesitation. Pulling his wand out of his sleeve and dropping it onto the ground, Gaara looked around the room and saw Draco. He would have liked to wave, but he knew sudden moves would only provoke violence, and he was once again too tired to start unnecessary fights with Aurors.

 

He hadn’t slept for three days and he had hardly stopped moving either. He deserved a bath.

 

“Get down, face down on the ground!” The same Auror commanded. “Now!”

 

Gaara looked at the floor. Polished marble and quite clean, barring the blood spreading from the body at his feet. Still…

 

Gaara shook his head. The cork of his gourd popped off and fell to floor, but the Aurors all tensed and another shouted this time, “Stop or we will stun you!”

 

The leader who had shouted everything else thus far piped up again, “Do not activate your weapon. Release the buckle and set it on the floor, then get down on the ground!”

 

Gaara looked at him, then took a pointed look at the floor, then up at the Aurors again and shook his head.

 

Draco was so relieved to see his friend was okay and had come back, but his relief was tinged with equal parts frustration at his dense friend’s ignoring Auror commands, and hilarity at watching these grown men circle around Gaara unsure of what to do about a teenager who wouldn’t listen to what they said.

 

Eventually the commander, judging by the corpse at Gaara’s feet and his unwillingness to cooperate, decided to subtly signal the Auror in the back to stun Gaara. Then they could disarm him while he slept and get to the bottom of this.

 

Instead of the red magic hitting the back of the boys head and the incident being over, sand shot out of the gourd faster than they could see and blocked the spell, and the boy looked over his shoulder as if surprised it had happened.

 

The sand slowly shrunk back into his gourd and he dared not call it back out when these men looked ready to start a battle. Gaara slowly raised his hands above his head, hoping that would suffice since he had no intention of getting on the floor or entirely disarming himself.

 

Draco and the elder Malfoys watched this with mounting dread since Gaara now couldn’t communicate and clearly had no intention of surrendering. Lucius kept one eye on Draco to make sure he didn’t run out and do anything stupid or _brave_.

 

Dumbledore was slowly easing his way through the now standing crowd to handle this. Whatever Gaara had done, Albus wasn’t about to let him get taken into custody when the Ministry were so clearly interested in the boy. Fudge was staying conspicuously quiet throughout this surprise interruption, which couldn’t mean anything good.

 

Harry, Ron and Hermione wanted to intervene as well, if only to inform or remind the Aurors that Gaara couldn’t speak, but Snape signalled for them to stay quiet. With Snape’s attitude towards Gaara, that could just mean that he didn’t want them saving him…

 

Other than Dumbledore’s old-man-shuffling through the crowd, the atrium was motionless and quiet. The Aurors were just waiting for an excuse or an order.

 

And then the corpse at Gaara’s feet groaned loudly.

 

Hushed whispers roared amongst the reporters and guests, and the Aurors started closing in on this very strange teenager, just about ready to take him down to retrieve the severely injured man at his feet.

 

“Stop.”

 

The softly spoken word rang out for the Aurors to hear, but those stood by their seats or on the podium were too far away and mired in their own hushed conversations.

 

The second they had seen his lips move, the whispers died and they listened to what followed. The majority were simply curious as anyone would be, but those who had an acquaintance with Gaara edged forward to hear his voice for the very first time (or second, in Draco’s case).

 

“This is Peter Pettigrew. He framed Sirius Black and has been hiding as a rat ever since. Sirius Black is innocent. You will release him.”

 

“That’s preposterous!” Fudge said. “Now-”

 

Gaara kicked the man on the floor so that he would roll over and chip in. There laid Peter Pettigrew, minus a finger he had cut off to escape, and a two other fingers that had been cut off more recently. The rest of his injuries would later be catalogued and would explain why he had been so quick to incriminate himself.

 

“It’s true, I am Peter Pettigrew.” The man sobbed, coughing at the end and spitting up a little bit of blood. Whatever had happened to this man between his escape and now surely hadn’t been pretty. “I did it! I sold out James and Lily to the Dark Lord!”

 

The reporters had stayed at a respectful distance until now, but in light of a long dead hero coming back to life to exonerate a villainous criminal was too juicy to miss. They surged forward and the Aurors marking Gaara had to turn and become crowd controllers.

 

Fudge recovered his wits and spoke loudly into his microphone so people would stop ignoring him. “Well, that certainly is a bold statement to make, and once our Aurors have taken care of this man’s wounds, they will take his statement and we can get to the bottom of everything.”

 

Gaara had planned on this. The Minister would take Pettigrew to a back room, have him killed and disposed of, and then claim it had been a stranger off of the street and Gaara would be imprisoned for kidnapping.

 

Hermione was fighting back tears of relief that Pettigrew had been caught, and Harry was trying to get past Snape who was keeping all three on the platform.

 

Gaara’s plan had relied on only one person being present today, and he wormed his way to the front of the crowd with an impressive dexterity for his age. Dumbledore was the only person present who could reliably identify Pettigrew, in front of the papers as well.

 

“Headmaster Dumbledore, is this Pettigrew?” The reporters all stopped shouting questions or demanding the Aurors let them past to hear the answer.

 

Albus had not been entirely sure of what to believe these past few days. He wanted to believe Remus and Sirius, his old comrades and students, and his current students. But Sirius had always had a silver tongue and could have led them all astray, and he was terrified his actions might release the wrong man. But that was preferable to condemning the wrong one.

 

Now, here was Gaara of all people, with the living Peter in tow. It was hard to swallow.

 

He looked long and hard at the bloodied face and while he was not 100% certain, he was close enough that he could risk it. “That is Peter Pettigrew.”

 

The reporters went crazy at the announcement, now bustling for Dumbledore’s comment as well as Gaara’s. A few even broke off to get Fudge’s comment as he stood on an abandoned podium looking dumbstruck.

 

There was nothing he could do to cover this up now! He hadn’t honestly bought the story Harry Potter had spouted on Black’s behalf, but now there was a more pressing issue. Did he deny it so that Black was Kissed and half of his problem went away? After all, a dead man couldn’t sue you.

 

Well, actually there had been the case of Alexander Saxis’ ghost in the fifteenth-century… but a _soulless_ man couldn’t sue him, that was for sure.

 

But when it became clear he had been told multiple times of the possibility of Black’s innocence, and even after another culprit had been brought forward he ignored it, he would never be able to appease the bloodhounds in the press.

 

Which left only one choice: “Sirius Black’s sentence will be postponed until the veracity of this claim can be verified. If this man is, as he claims, the long-dead Peter Pettigrew, he will take Black’s place in Azkaban and providing Mr Black has not committed any crimes since his… escape from Azkaban, he will be freed.”

 

Gaara knelt down and instantly had Peter’s eyes on him. “Tell the truth, or I will come back.”

 

Peter would rather go to that hellish prison than stay with this insane, sadistic, demonic, little monster. He’d been caught two days ago and it had only taken twelve hours to get to the Ministry from there.

 

After that, Pettigrew was taken away to be interrogated while Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Severus were questioned again now that their stories weren’t dismissed offhand. The Aurors, still wary of him, doubly so after he had collected his wand, tried to usher Gaara to a back room to question him (in the room next to Pettigrew’s) but Dumbledore stepped in before Gaara had to ‘assert himself’.

 

“I think Gaara here has had enough excitement for one week. He’ll be returning to Hogwarts with his classmates and Head of House. If you wish to take his statement, the Ministry is always welcome to come and visit him at the castle. Now, if you will excuse us, I would like to return to the school before my old knees give out.” He smiled at the Aurors and walked past them to guide Gaara away, back to where Snape had the other three corralled. The reporters were all now being moved slowly away from the main hall of the atrium, back towards the exit. For once, Fudge had enough attention.

 

Draco rushed through the lingering politicians and dignitaries, away from his mother and father who were still processing, to Gaara. He tried to hug his friend, who he had truly though might be dead, only to be dodged by the redhead. Said Jinchūriki cursed that his sand only automatically blocked harmful approaches.

 

“I cannot believe you have been hunting a murderer for the last couple of days while I was in the hospital.” Draco’s good will had evaporated and now he was back to indignity.

 

Gaara looked at him blankly, as he usually did.

 

“Hold on, I know you can talk now. Don’t just ignore me!” Draco yelled. He looked around and went red when he realised the MINISTER FOR MAGIC was watching him, along with the Headmaster, Snape, and Potter and his cronies. “I expect you to explain everything when we get back.” He said under his breath.

 

Lucius strolled over with Narcissa in tow. “Well, Headmaster; never a dull moment, eh? With children as wilful as these around, it’s a wonder you are still volunteering to take charge of them all.”

 

“They keep me youthful, Lucius. Will young Draco be joining us or would you rather take him back to the castle yourself?”

 

Draco looked up at his father but refrained from asking to go with Gaara. If father wanted him to travel separately, he would say so. It would only embarrass the family if he spoke up.

 

“I don’t see why not, I will be taking him home tomorrow in any case.” Draco then thought about how he was going to convince his parents to let him stay the remaining week of school after playing up his injuries since he woke up. His mother was usually the soft touch, but she would want to coddle him at home. He would have to petition father.

 

It wouldn’t be too difficult since his father had not-so-subtly mentioned further allying them with Gaara since his power was evidently worth acquiring.

 

The Golden Trio scowled at Draco but stayed expressionless with Gaara. Harry still disliked the boy, Ron felt the same way, and Hermione was more scared than she felt it proper for a Gryffindor to be. All while they wrestled with the fact that not only had this contemptuous Slytherin saved their lives that night, but now he had effectively freed Harry’s godfather singlehandedly.

 

Harry settled for not insulting him verbally. Hermione flashed a nervous smile. Ron still frowned, but didn’t look at Gaara while he did it.

 

Gaara saw the odd faces they were all making and wondered whether he should have sent Pettigrew in through the post.

 

Snape still audibly snarled at Gaara. The consistency was nice.

 

The Malfoy adults coldly said their farewells to Draco, and spared a moment to wish Snape and Gaara well too, before stepping back, turning away and walking to another floo to go home and make up their next evil plan. That was Ron’s loudly whispered conclusion, which Draco didn’t appreciate.

 

The Minister didn’t look happy or at ease approaching them, but he wished them the same fond farewell, and then left quickly.

 

They went through the floo one at a time, with Gaara going by himself at his own insistence.

 

They arrived at Dumbledore’s office, and the Headmaster asked them all to go back to their dormitories for the time being. He would contact them as soon as he had any news about Sirius.

 

“Could you wait a moment, Gaara?”

 

Gaara sighed with creased brows. He’d seen this coming. Draco went on ahead, but wasn’t happy to do so. “I’ll meet you outside.” He waited at the bottom of the winding staircase and watching the Gryffindorks and Professor Snape leave.

 

Dumbledore sat behind his desk heavily. The day, which had promised to be a difficult one at the outset, had still somehow thrown him for a loop.

 

“When I invited you to join this school, I did so because you were a lost child in need of a safe place to stay and learn. All of the mysteries around you, I put to bed because I told myself they were not important. However, after the stories I have heard not from the Ministry or the newspapers but from witnesses from my own staff, about the attack three nights ago, I have to ask you the questions I have been avoiding all year.

 

“First of all, who are you?”

 

Gaara waited and mulled over how he was going to play this. “I am Gaara.”

 

Albus sighed. “What is your surname, Gaara?”

 

“I do not have one. In my home village, we do not use second names.”

 

“Then where is it that you are from?”

 

“Far away. It is of no further consequence.”

 

“I am afraid I have to disagree, Gaara. I need to know where your home is. You told me your mother and father had passed away. Is there not anyone there that will miss you, or used to take care of you?”

 

“There are, but that does not matter right now.”

 

“Are you in hiding?” Dumbledore suspected for a while now that this was the case. It would explain a lot.

 

“No.”

 

“Why are you in Britain? How did you come to be here?”

 

“I would rather not say.”

 

“I am afraid I must insist, Gaara. Very soon, men and women will come to ask these same questions, and they can ask them of me, or they can ask them of you. After what happened, it will not be just the Ministry of Magic that will want to speak with you, but a great number of Witches and Wizards with other intentions in mind.”

 

“Where and who I come from are not relevant.”

 

Dumbledore sighed and sagged. “Very well then, I will let that be for the moment. Now, tell me, how do you know Sirius Black?”

 

Gaara wondered if he was going to be in trouble for his part in Sirius’ time on the lamb. “He helped me when I first arrived here and has been my friend since.”

 

“Did you help him gain entry into the castle this year?”

 

“No, I told him to leave. He was looking for Pettigrew.”

 

“In the castle?”

 

“He is an animagus, a rat. He has been hiding here for a long time.” Gaara didn’t feel the need to drag the Weasleys into this just yet. They would be named in the papers before long when Peter got talking.

 

Dumbledore had heard this from Harry and his friends, but he needed to corroborate as many details as he could from Gaara. “What happened three days ago, when the school was attacked?”

 

“Draco and I were out for a walk and the dementors attacked. Draco was hurt by them so I killed the dementors.”

 

That was it. Such a climactic night and that was all Gaara had to say on the matter.

 

“May I ask, just many dementors did you kill?”

 

“I don’t know. All of them, I think.”

 

“All of them? Are you saying you were solely responsible for _killing_ every dementor on the grounds?”

 

“Yes. They were attacking and I have heard of what they do to people when they attack. I couldn’t let them suck the souls out of everyone here.”

 

“I am very glad to hear you say that, Gaara. I take an enormous comfort from knowing that you would use your powers to protect those weaker than yourself. I am sorry to say, however, that there are many that will not find such comfort in your past actions. They will merely see you for your powers, considerable as they are.”

 

“I have known people like that from my home. I am not a weapon, and I will not be used.”

 

“Quite right, too. There are a lot of things I need to ask still, but there will be a time for that. Right now, I would like to ask one more question: when did your voice return?”

 

“Not long ago. It has taken a long time to heal. It hurts now.”

 

“I am sorry for asking so much, then. Though, I fear you will be asked much more by your peers when you venture into the Great Hall tonight. You may go now. You could probably rest after tracking and capturing that wily rat. I would suggest you rest today.” Albus smiled at him. He had heard what he needed to from Gaara, for the moment.

 

As Gaara reached the door, Dumbledore spoke again, “While I will forever by in your debt for saving the lives of my staff and my students, I must warn you that if you destroy any more towers, I will have to deduct House points.” He smiled and watched Gaara leave. Gaara hadn’t turned so Albus didn’t know if he had received a smile.

 

Albus’ own smile didn’t last long. There was a great deal to rejoice at, from the safety of those precious people around him, the impending freedom of Sirius, to the return and confidence of Gaara, and others. But he also had to come to terms with the fact that there had been people he might have helped who had not felt safe to approach him with their secrets. If Gaara or Remus or even Sirius had come to him, he would like to think he would have been able to see past Peter’s lies to the truth.

 

Then again, if Albus couldn’t be sure he would have helped Sirius, how could anyone else know?

 

He called for a cup of tea, and sat back in his chair. It wasn’t yet noon, so he had enough time for a short nap. He was needing those more and more often lately.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

That afternoon, Gaara and Draco had a long overdue chat.

 

“So you knew Sirius Black this whole time, even before you met me?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“…and you knew Professor Lupin before school started?”

 

Gaara nodded.

 

“And you’ve been working with them all year…”

 

Gaara didn’t bother responding to that one. The fact was, Draco had asked all of these questions ten minutes ago and was going around in circles, massaging his eyes as he tried and failed to process.

 

“What?!”

 

Gaara didn’t even widen his eyes this time at Draco’s exclamation.

 

“You’ve been working with a convicted serial killer this whole time, and you never through to mention it to me?!”

 

“Mass murderer.”

 

“What?”

 

“He was a convicted mass murderer, not a serial killer.”

 

“I don’t care what _kind_ of murderer he is- was!” Draco seemed angry, but more from frustration than any real animosity towards Gaara. “So does that mean that they know where you’re from?”

 

Gaara nodded. In fact, those two knew where he was _really_ from.

 

“Do they know about your transformations?”

 

“No. Do not tell them.”

 

Strangely, Draco seemed to take solace in being privy to a secret the adults had been kept away from, even if Gaara was exhibiting his ‘killer eyes’ he used to scare people away from him. Obviously it meant a great deal to the foreigner to keep this from Sirius Black and Remus Lupin specifically.

 

Draco settled back onto his bed, running his hand through his previously pristinely slick-backed hair.

 

Gaara had hoped this would signal the end of Draco’s histrionics, but he soon regained his energy and continued. Most of the rest of the cycle was along the lines of “you didn’t trust me? Me?!” and “you killed all of those dementors… you can kill dementors?”

 

Finally, he was running out of energy and could stop himself from calming down. “So, you’re were-tanuki, whatever they are. You were in league with a mass murderer _and_ a werewolf behind mine and everyone else’s back. You were forcibly sent here from a distant land. Is there anything else?”

 

Gaara thought long and hard. He didn’t have too many secrets left, other than Shukaku which he didn’t think he would ever willingly share, unless he needed to. His demonic tenant and his home being on another world. Since Lupin, Sirius and even Luna knew about his world travelling, he didn’t see the harm in telling Draco too.

 

Plus, Draco would be insufferable if he knew Luna found out first again.

 

“My home is on another world.”

 

Draco eyes shot wide and Gaara knew this conversation wasn’t ending any time soon.

 

It took a while for Draco to let Gaara elaborate on his bombshell, describing some of the main differences between their worlds to start with. Fortunately, Draco was so uninformed about other cultures in his own world, he didn’t struggle too much in coming to terms with what Gaara’s was like. 

 

He also went about explaining the process of moving from one world to another, though he left out the specific reason his enemy had transported him here. Draco had seemed almost relieved to hear that was where the majority of Gaara’s curiously fast-fading scars had come from, as well as his mutism.

 

With this secret out in the open, he was a little more forthcoming with answers to Draco’s many questions, although whenever they strayed into dangerous territory, he clammed up again.

 

Despite the many stunned lapses in conversation and the state of his hair, Gaara thought Draco had taken all of this remarkably well.

 

By the time dinner came around, Gaara had spoken more in this one day that he had for the previous year in Suna. It was his punishment for avoiding speech for so long, he supposed.

 

Before dinner, after Draco had calmed down and had stopped asking him serial questions, Gaara ducked out of their room and snuck past their Housemates as he had when he had returned hours earlier. It was difficult since they all clearly knew he was back and wanted to talk to him. He was no longer the no-name weirdo. He was the next big thing.

 

Great…

 

He wanted to go and speak to Remus, catch him up on what happened. He was intercepted by people he wanted to talk to even less than the Slytherins back in the dormitory. Suspiciously close to the hidden entrance to his House he found Potter, Weasley and Granger lying in wait.

 

“Gaara!” Hermione called as soon as his face peeked out of the entrance.

 

He wilted a little.

 

He didn’t run away, though, since otherwise they would just keep trying to track him down. He had a week left at the school and he didn’t want it to be filled with avoiding these three. It was bad enough he’d had to do it as a tanuki.

 

“We- I wanted to thank you for what you’ve done for Sirius.” Potter said. He was like a scolded child forced to apologise by an embarrassed parent.

 

Said parent then nudged Weasley with her elbow and he continued, “I’m sorry about thinking you were evil.”

 

“We shouldn’t have jumped to conclusions, so I hope you’ll forgive us, Gaara.” Hermione finished.

 

Gaara wondered if they had prepared that or if she was just predisposed to concluding like that.

 

“Okay.”

 

Ron gritted his teeth at the dismissal but Harry stopped him before the ginger could do anything brash.

 

“Do you think we could sit down and talk over a few things? I’m sure we would all like to fill in the gaps about what we know. After all, we’re all friends of Sirius. We should try to get on, shouldn’t we?” Hermione reasoned.

 

A natural rhetorician, then.

 

“No.” Gaara then walked away, on to Lupin’s office. He heard Harry say some things about him as he left, and then he heard Ron agree and continue on.

 

“I bet he could talk all along, he’s just got a stick shoved so far up his-”

 

“Ronald!”

 

“-that he couldn’t talk around it.”

 

He found Remus packing suitcases in his quarters and didn’t bother knocking as he entered. Silent as he walked, he gave the grown man quite the fright when the lycanthrope noticed him.

 

“Gaara, when did you get here?”

 

“A minute ago.”

 

“I had heard rumours about your stunt at the Ministry, and I’ll admit the part I found hardest to believe was that you could talk.”

 

“It’s strange. People keep talking to me.”

 

“That does tend to happen, but that could also be because of your heroics the other night. You saved a lot of lives.” Remus sat down on a large piece of luggage and gestured for Gaara to as well. “So you found Peter, did you?”

 

Gaara nodded.

 

“I heard he was in pretty bad shape when you handed him over. Accident on your way in?”

 

Gaara paused and then nodded slowly.

 

“I can’t blame you for that, I suppose. I know what I would have done to him, and Merlin only knows what Sirius would have done given half the chance. Still, since he hasn’t had a chance to yet, and on my behalf too, I wanted to thank you. You have freed one of my friends and brought to justice the man who betrayed the others.”

 

Gaara nodded his acceptance.

 

“I’ve told Harry this already, but I was going to come and find you at dinner. I won’t be here for the final week and I won’t be coming back next year either. It seems Lucius Malfoy caught wind of my… issues after the attack and… Well, it looks like the information has mysteriously circulated amongst a number of more conservative parents. I’ve tendered my resignation before they can have me fired.”

 

“Hn.” Gaara processed this. One less reason to return to the school, but Draco and the books were still here. Still, it was a shame.

 

“I’ve enjoyed this year more than any I can remember since being a student in these very halls. A large part of that is thanks to you, Gaara. I want you to know that.”

 

Gaara nodded. He may not be mute anymore, but he had no clue how to respond to such emotional outpouring.

 

“I’m going to finish packing here, and then I’m going to the Ministry to pick up Sirius in a couple of hours. They haven’t announced it yet, they’re waiting until he’s away from any microphones before they tell the papers, but he’s been fully acquitted. He’ll be staying in my apartment until he can sort out his own place in the next few days. I was only able to talk to him for a minute, but he said… well, he asked me to ask you if you wanted to come and live with him. He understands if you want to live with Draco during the summer or if you have other plans… but…”

 

“I don’t have any other plans.” Lupin’s face brightened as if he were the one getting the friend to live with.

 

“I’m sure Draco will be allowed to visit.” Lupin wasn’t really so sure. Sirius wouldn’t mind, he’d make great sport out of pranking Malfoy Jr., but Malfoy Sr. would probably take issue. No need to worry Gaara unnecessarily.

 

Gaara chatted with Lupin for a little while, switching back over to sand when his voice started to croak. Upon prompting, he told of how he had left the castle to track down Wormtail. The difficulty had been immense since he was essentially tracking one rat through a forest after a four hour head start. It had been made harder and much simpler when he discovered Peter was intermittently switching between man and rat. He could travel a much greater distance as a human, but he was infinitely easier to find. Still, using all of the sand he had amassed that night and giving himself a serious migraine by using so many _Third-Eye_ s, his sand tendrils finally found the rat-man on a bus from Aberdeen to Manchester, just outside of Haymarket.

 

Lupin had asked what happened after that, seeing as the capture had been surprisingly smooth, but Gaara had just concluded with ‘We travelled from the bus stop to London on my sand. He wanted to tell the truth.’

 

Lupin let the subject drop since the brief glimpses he’d been given of the realities of Gaara’s brutal childhood still made him uncomfortable, and if Gaara hadn’t done the sorts of things Remus could never endorse, Sirius might be gone now.

 

Gaara left Remus to finish packing so that he wasn’t late to picking up Sirius, but before Gaara went, Lupin assured him that they would see each other over the summer all the time.

 

Gaara had assumed as much.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Dinner that night had been so bad Gaara wished he had been able to escape Draco’s watchful eye without resorting to his old violent tactics. Draco had been resolute that Gaara join him for dinner that night since he hadn’t heard back from his father yet and he didn’t want to risk missing his last dinner with Gaara.

 

The demon-host entered the Great Hall and, not for the first time, the Hall had gone silent. They all stared at him as if he were Merlin reborn.

 

His Housemates were the first to recover, having known he was present all day even if they hadn’t seen him. They stood and started clapping, followed swiftly by most everybody from the other three houses and most of the teachers (barring the obvious exception). The round of applause only made Gaara visibly uncomfortable, which spurred on a couple of begrudging Gryffindors that needed the extra incentive.

 

Gaara sat as far away from his housemates as he could manage. But where he used to be able to achieve the requisite distance simply by sitting at the end of the table and glaring away all of his peers, now he had to rely on Draco to physically block any of the over-eager teen and preteen admirers. Everyone wanting to talk to him, thank him for his ‘heroics’, question his abilities, or simply hear his voice first-hand; it was miserable.

 

Draco did his best to reassert his dominance over Slytherin, imperiously demanding some peace and quiet while they ate, but even if he had been the prince he was before, no one could resist bothering Gaara now that they knew he wasn’t a threat to the students (which would not hold true for much longer if they kept at their ruckus).

 

Fortunately, after nine months of blankly ignoring people and not answering questions, Gaara was perfectly prepared. And if they didn’t leave him alone, he might have to fall back on some earlier habits he had formed…

 

The Headmaster had taken pity on Gaara and elected not to direct any more attention to the curmudgeonly boy, instead announcing the good news regarding Sirius Black and teaching his students a lesson about never assuming a person’s guilt without thoroughly examining the facts. He also hinted that the Ministry was not as infallible as they might like them all to believe. He didn’t want to entirely undermine the government, but a critical mind was a healthy mind.

 

In the evening, after Gaara had darted through the crowd and out of the Hall, the red-head took some time for himself to relax. It was a pleasantly warm June evening, (for Scotland) so he settled atop the Astronomy Tower to nap under the stars. He hadn’t slept in a few very hectic days and he settled in for his reward. Draco wouldn’t be happy about being ditched, but then he was never happy about being ditched.

 

The next morning, Draco received word that he was allowed to stay for the remaining week (and was told to confirm Gaara’s summer plans). While Draco enjoyed his breakfast, he watched over half the student body saying tearful farewells to their friends. Parents had overwhelmingly wanted to withdraw their children early from Hogwarts, but only that slim majority had been able to take the time off work or could justify taking their child out of education for the week.

 

Classes would resume later than normal that Monday, to accommodate the leaving students. By ten, Draco was among eleven Slytherin that hadn’t been taken out, including Gaara.

 

It was only after the mass exodus had taken place that Gaara reappeared. He still got too much attention, but with the Slytherin table thinned out he could at least eat in some semblance of peace once more. He was approached a number of times for autographs, which he had considered granting to get rid of the gnats flying around him but Draco had been quick to shoo them off. Apparently he was well versed in how celebrities should behave and Gaara couldn’t just go around giving autographs to anybody.

 

Gaara didn’t care as long as Draco intercepted them all.

 

The classes were so greatly reduced in number that all four Houses would be taught together and still not fill all of the seats, depending on the year group. It was clearly difficult for the teachers to keep their students on track when it was clear the material would have to be repeated at the beginning of next term when the missing students returned.

 

The exception to this was Snape, who openly admitted everything he covered this week would not be re-taught. If those slackers wanted to run home early, they would have to make up the work on their own time.

 

He was clearly upset about his Order of Merlin being rescinded, according to Ron.

 

Defence Against the Dark Arts was taught on a rolling basis by any professor who didn’t have a class at the time thanks to the missing students. Some were better for the task than others. When Gaara saw Snape standing in the classroom on Wednesday, he turned straight on his heel and walked straight back out without breaking his stride. Snape didn’t even frown at this, just got back to torturing the Gryffindors.

 

The professors, no matter how grateful they were to Gaara for his actions, had to remain objective in treating him like any other student (as much as they ever had). McGonagall was the first, on Tuesday, to call on Gaara to answer a question in front of the class.

 

It had been a simple enough question but it had caused a hush to fall and heads to turn as he answered in his clipped tone. Clearly he was never particularly loquacious even before his accident. Nevertheless, his year mates were all quite pleased to hear Gaara’s long awaited voice. It was nothing special, really, but anticipation made it seem special to their ears.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

During the week, most of his interactions with people who weren’t adults or Draco involved glaring at a pestilential admirer. Then there were the Weasley Twins.

 

None of the Weasley litter had been allowed to board the Hogwarts Express on Monday, for the obvious financial reasons, and the Twins had been revelling in their freedom since the school was practically empty. They could practice any number of their more _reactive_ prank ideas without being discovered.

 

They had been in their rooms when the chaos of the Thursday morning attack had begun. There had been shouting and then they had been called away from their windows and into the Common Room, where a seventh-year they couldn’t name and Professor Babbling were casting incorporeal Patroni to repel dementors trying to enter through the open portrait.

 

No one had known what to do since the fireplace was blocked so they couldn’t floo away, and the Headmaster and their Head of House were both out of the castle for the night, so they had no way of escaping nor calling for help. The younger students cried and screamed, the older ones wished they were powerful enough to be able to cast the Patronus Charm.

 

Fred and George had been quick to notice their youngest brother was missing from the crowd, along with Harry and Hermione. They weren’t surprised, but they were worried. Immensely.

 

For the entire attack, everyone over the age of thirteen had known that eventually their protectors would tire and they would be left defenceless against the worst fate known to wizard-kind. Of course, when the moody thirteen-year olds had figured out this desperate truth, they were quick to loudly announce their doom to the younger children so that everyone could panic and suffer.

 

Fred and George believed they were done for until someone had shouted about what was happening outside. They had run to the window and watched Gaara perform feats that seemed to be straight out of Arthurian legend, and save all of their lives. Then, they found out he had saved their younger brother’s ungrateful life. Then they found out he had saved Harry’s godfather from being Kissed and captured their family pet.

 

Never before had they been so grateful to not be given Scabbers after Percy. They might have liked to make jokes about Percy sleeping with his precious pet rat, but it just seemed a little cruel at this point. They were  also rather curious why Scabbers’ name had never been revealed on their old Map, but it seemed inconsequential at this point.

 

In light of what Gaara had done for their family, they felt duty bound to do something outside of their comfort-zone: earnestly thank someone. No mockery, no pranks, no joking or laughing. It was awkward and uncomfortable, doubly so because it was to Gaara. 

 

After they had cornered and sincerely thanked him for saving them, their brother, their friends, and their school, they had to go and do something cruel to an obnoxious fourth year to cleanse themselves.

 

They had considered, in light of his service to the school, whether they should return the Pranking Crown to him (an entirely figurative object they were looking into making over the summer holiday) but decided saving the school was about as far from a practical joke as one could go. Gaara would appreciate the title if he earned it back properly.

 

Gaara had received many such unnecessary expressions of gratitude over the week, but these two had been a surprise. Their senses of humour had reminded him so strongly of _that person_ back in his world, it was a further shock when they had affirmed their attachment to their ‘precious people’, so to speak.

 

The other person of interest had been Luna.

 

She hadn’t been such a surprise. He had seen her only briefly on the Monday morning, as the sun was rising. How she had known he was out on the Astronomy Tower, or indeed if she had known at all or had just happened to find him there, Gaara would never know. She was being called home by her father, who had not been willing to say whether she would be returning in September (a common problem amongst the student body).

 

She had been oddly emotional, Gaara recalled. She had been grateful, but more she had been worried apparently by his disappearance. And she had been scared by his power. She said it was evil even though he wasn’t.

 

She hadn’t elaborated, which Gaara appreciated. With all of these people telling him he was a hero, it was hard to keep his head and remember that he was a monster that housed a demon. Shukaku’s chakra was not a miraculous solution to problems, it was his curse and his cross to bear.

 

Still, Luna had hugged him and thanked him nonetheless, for saving her and everyone. She insisted that she would write to him weekly and hoped he would write back even if he didn’t really want to. She also wanted him to update her on his monthly transformations, in case there were any changes (or possibly if any photos happened to be taken).

 

He made no commitments, but wished her well.

 

By the end of the week, he was looking forward to being away from all of these people. It was difficult hearing so often how good a person he was when he knew they would all change their minds in a second if they knew who he really was. What he really was.

 

At least Sirius would likely get over any nonsense notions of Gaara’s virtues after living in close proximity for two months. Draco had gotten over any lingering gratitude in a matter of days.

 

Dumbledore had called on him for a visit once more on Thursday afternoon to discuss Sirius’ claim of guardianship. To the old man’s credit, he seemed to honestly be checking on Gaara’s feelings on the matter. He had also warned Gaara that, being an ex-prisoner of Azkaban, innocent or not, would have affected Sirius’ mind profoundly and that moving in with him so soon after the man’s acquittal might not make for the easiest living situation.

 

After he assured the headmaster that he was content to stay with Sirius over the holiday, he left quickly to avoid any further interrogation on his past or powers.

 

As hectic as these last days were, Gaara actually looked forward to the closing feast, marking the end of the year. Of course, preceding that had the onslaught of summer assignments by their teachers who had had to assure each class that the students who left early would receive the same homework as well, through the post.

 

The feast was held on two tables so that the reduced numbers wouldn’t be so spread out, to Gaara’s chagrin.

 

“Well, it’s the first time I can remember where I have had to perform this duty to so few students. This year has been one of the most eventful in living memory. A rather long span of time, I might add. I will spare you from any further oratories when I know you are all eager to tuck in and then get back to packing your things to return home.

 

“Before you do, however, I have a few more duties to which I must attend. First, I have to announce the winner of the coveted House Cup. This year, it should come as no surprise, goes to Ravenclaw!” The largest remaining House cheered raucously. Slytherin might have been a contender, especially since Gaara had been given two hundred points for his service to the school, but tallied against the many hundreds he had lost by skipping class, ignoring professors’ instructions, or simply existing (Snape), Slytherin had still come in last for the first time in living memory.

 

The few snakes present weren’t all that bothered. They might not have the House Cup this year but they did have Gaara. Bragging rights were still firmly theirs.

 

“It is also my pleasure to announce this year’s House Quidditch champions are… Slytherin!” This didn’t get much in the way of cheering since the results had been known since the last match, but as the only team member present, it fell to Draco to get up and collect the trophy, which Snape would take after dinner to put back in its display case. It seemed a little absurd when it was just him there holding it so he didn’t wait long to return to his seat with it.

 

Usually, in Draco’s experience, the Headmaster would normally then give a toast to next year’s league; but he stayed rather quiet instead, conspicuously so, even sharing a look with McGonagall.

 

“Now, I have conferred with the governors and we have agreed that in light on recent events, a special recognition must be paid to the brave actions of five of our very own students in saving not only an innocent man from a terrible fate, but also protecting our school from attack. Please, would Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, Ronald Weasley, Gaara, and Draco Malfoy join me at the front.”

 

Draco glanced around and repeatedly looked to Gaara, trying to figure out why he was being awarded for his inaction on the night of the attack. It took him half the walk to the podium to realise that his father’s position on the board of governors and within the Ministry likely had a great many people convinced the Malfoy heir had played a pivotal role in the event.

 

He had the good grace to stand a little off to the side, away from those that actually had a hand in the heroics, when he reached the front. Gaara would have walked out of the hall entirely, away from this ridiculousness, but Draco had been between him and the door when he got up from the table.

 

Gaara made no move to take the plaque from the proffering wrinkled hands of the Headmaster so Harry stepped forward to take it instead. It was inscribed with their five names and was an award for ‘Special Services Rendered to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry’ and referenced the date.

 

Once again, it was a strange sight, seeing a given name without either a middle or surname. Carved into the polished silver was: Gaara, Harry James Potter, Draco Lucius Malfoy, Ronald Bilius Weasley and Hermione Jean Granger.

 

Draco suspected the ordering of the names had been a hotly debated topic since a number of the governors, his father chief amongst them, would not have stood for a mudblood (or a girl) coming anywhere but last on the list. And whilst Draco was clearly on there as an honorary position, he had been named before the mudblood and the sixth son of the dirty poor Weasley clan.

 

Fortunately, the finer points of politics were beyond Ron who was smiling like there was no tomorrow, and even Harry had overcome his disappointment over the Quidditch Cup and Draco’s unexplained presence to enjoy the honour being bestowed upon him. Gaara hadn’t bothered looking at the award, and Hermione looked like she might bite all the way through her pursed lips after harshly passing it on.

 

The insult wasn’t lost on her.

 

Harry tried to hand the plaque off to Gaara to take back to his seat, an olive branch and recognition of who had played the bigger role. Gaara looked down at it, looked at Harry, then shook his head and continued to his seat.

 

Again, Gaara might have skipped this occasion entirely were it not acting as an official function too. It was confusing because it felt like every other dinner barring the awarding of commendations, but even Gaara had been invited to a few ceremonies and state dinners since the last Kazekage’s death and knew they were important.

 

Temari’s lessons on social functions had not yet gotten to explaining why such gatherings were important, only what Gaara had to do when he was there, by the time he had been exiled to this world. In hindsight, listening to yet another endless bloviating speech, Gaara suspected the reason Temari had never explained why it was important to sit through these things was because there wasn’t a good reason and she knew he would happily get up and walk out in the middle.

 

When it was finally done, he did leave abruptly.

 

Dinner wasn’t yet finished but he didn’t like deserts anyway.

 

No one gave him a second look, so used to his antisocial eccentricities by now. It was rare he stayed all the way through dinner.

 

Dumebledore watched him leave and was glad the boy had stayed all the way through the closing ceremony. He had wanted to give an extra-long speech about what exactly Gaara did, but he thought better of it and refrained.

 

Everyone there knew what had happened first or second hand, and Gaara certainly wouldn’t appreciate the effort.

 

When Draco got back to their room, he found Gaara reading on his bed again. Draco had spent the evenings of most of the week packing his many possessions into two trunks. He meticulously folded his clothes and stacked his books, all the while cursing Potter for freeing Dobby. It had been so much easier when he could leave these plebeian tasks to the servants.

 

Not that his family’s house elf should have been in the castle in the first place, but that was neither here nor there.

 

Of course, Gaara was less than sympathetic to his plight, both regarding his old slave and the task of packing. When asked why he hadn’t started packing, Gaara had replied that it would take only a few minutes. Draco knew Gaara wasn’t overburdened with possessions, but even then he couldn’t imagine Gaara was going to have an easy time packing everything away properly in the morning before the train departed.

 

He _was_ taking the train, wasn’t he?

 

It had not come as much of a shock that Gaara was going to live with Sirius Black after all that had come about. Nevertheless, Draco still felt disappointed that Gaara wasn’t going to living at the manor. It was so much more interesting when he had a friend there.

 

He had insisted Gaara have Sirius extend an invitation to him, but the nod he got meant little coming from Gaara, who might well decide he wanted to spend the entire season alone.

 

Draco would just flood him with owls until he received an invitation, or maybe he could simply invite Gaara to visit him?

 

No!

 

It would be undignified to put forth all of the effort in their friendship. It was bad enough he found himself as Gaara personal wrangler, almost in an official capacity at Hogwarts. In some small ways, he missed his minions.

 

Although… if Gaara came to the Malfoy homestead, Draco wouldn’t be forced into interacting with Potter, who was also supposed to be staying with Black. Honestly, the thought of Potter sharing a roof with Gaara for two months had him smiling every time he thought about it.

 

When he had put the finishing touches on his last case, Draco sat on his bed and picked up a book too. He had imagined, upon learning of Gaara’s returned voice, like many people, that it might prompt the occasional bout of speech from the foreigner, but he seemed less inclined than ever to communicate. Even now, he often used his sand to answer nonverbally if he bothered to answer at all.

 

Draco had asked, in light of this new discovery, whether Gaara was so quiet back in his home world. A strange concept that he had come to terms with faster than anybody would have give him credit for because it was frankly the only explanation that made sense.

 

Of course Gaara was from another world.

 

Gaara had, as he always did, Draco had come to notice, weighed up how much to share with Draco before answering. He nodded and that was that.

 

It had helped, this monumental revelation that not only were there other worlds out there, but that Gaara had come from one; that Gaara was still as infuriating no matter what country or dimension he came from.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Draco looked at the sparse crowd filing into the Hogwarts Express and thought he could get used to this staggered exodus. He might suggest to his father that they send different years home on different days so the train wouldn’t be so packed. The measure’s chief supporter would undoubtedly be Gaara, who probably had a little political capital of his own at the moment.

 

Then again, as extravagant as father was at home, he would still probably tell Draco it was too much. Then there would come a long lecture about not wasting money.

 

Draco couldn’t wait until he could apparate, or at least until he could persuade Gaara to teach him his sand shield trick. No one had bumped into Gaara since Gaara had known him.

 

Although, that hadn’t really been related to a physical inability so much as the terror. Now, Gaara just got smiles, cheers and attempted pats on the back. _Those_ were blocked by the sand.

 

They easily found a free compartment, the train being the same capacity it normally was and with half the students to fill it. It appeared no one had thought to uncouple a few cars for the reduced riders.

 

Gaara was very happy about this reduced ‘clutter’. He was free from the school for a couple of months, to see what other sources of information he could find. He might even take some time to explore this country. Since he was on an island, he might just restrict himself to this land and not try to venture too far, though. Draco would never let him hear the end of it if he missed the start of school next term.

 

The platinum blond had been humorously glad of Remus’ departure from the school and the diminished possibility he would be sharing a train ride with the outed werewolf.

 

The thought of anyone fearing Lupin, especially at any time but during the full moon, was enough to make Gaara smile.

 

He paid much more attention to the train ride this time around. He recognised some areas from his previous rides and from his flight back to Hogwarts, and also from his recent venture into the Scottish wilderness. It was a nice enough country, if you liked lots of life and water. And green…

 

It took hours to get back to London, but it was still much faster than Gaara had managed. As they entered the South East of England, Gaara assured Draco (not for the first time) that he _would_ write to him.

 

…With absolutely no intention of following through with it.

 

The train pulled into the station late in the afternoon, and a large number of adults were waiting there to pick up their children. Clearly, no matter that the attack had been resolved and no further dangers had presented themselves since, the parents were all very anxious to see their children again.

 

Gaara noted that Sirius was already there, standing within his own exclusion zone and was still garnering a number of open stares despite the long awaited train’s arrival. He was still gaunt and looked unhinged but he was wearing the finest robes Gaara had seen on anybody outside of a royal family. He had clearly gone to the finest wizard tailor in London and asked for the fanciest robes money could buy.

 

He looked emaciated and haunted but the robes looked rather dashing, all things considered.

 

Those around him were staring in awe but not crowding him, which made staying with him look a little more palatable. Still, if Gaara couldn’t stop Molly Weasley from approaching, Sirius didn’t stand a chance when she bustled her way through the crowd to her old comrade.

 

Seeing that woman hug his guardian, Gaara looked around for Lucius and Narcissa to check if he could wait with them until Mrs Weasley moved away. He found the pair standing apart from the masses as well. A lot of the students who had remained at Hogwarts this past week were there because it was cheaper, which left the Malfoys in very bad company on the train platform, in their eyes.

 

The train came to a halt and the students who had been standing out in the hallway since they passed over the county line forty-five minutes ago started to climb out onto the platform. Their parents were invariably right by the doors, so their tearful reunions all got in the way of those who had was yet to alight.

 

“I think it’s probably best if we say our goodbyes here.” Draco said.

 

Gaara looked over at him curiously. As far as he knew, it would be no more than a couple of weeks until they met up again, if not much sooner, and there was always the chance they might even exchange a couple of letters in the meantime. It didn’t seem necessary to say any more prolonged goodbyes.

 

Still, he was rather proud that he understood shirking off this strange little ritual would be hurtful to his friend.

 

“Goodbye. I will see you soon.” Even knowing that Draco was looking for something more open, this was the best Gaara could do. Draco seemed to accept that, unhappily.

 

As he had before, Gaara waited until the flood of students had already left the train before he opened the compartment door and led Draco out.

 

Platform 9¾ was heaving with people, even with the reduced number of passengers, because more parents and relatives had decided to come and greet their sons, daughters, nephews, nieces, or grandchildren after the harrowing events of the week before.

 

Luckily, the celebrity factor, which had begun to dim at the castle after the students had watched Gaara do little if anything extraordinary (or anything ordinary) since his heroic battle, was still strong in the minds of the adults who had read a couple of sparse mentions in the press and dozens of much more elaborate letters about his role.

 

They parted like the Red Sea, allowing him to walk unmolested to Sirius, who was smiling at the effect Gaara was having. The boy could clear rooms before, but now instead of fear Gaara was getting excitement wherever he went.

 

Draco branched off, more interested in seeing his parents than his long-lost relative. There would need to be formal introductions later anyway, with his parents present.

 

Molly Weasley had wandered back to her own family, thank the gods, so Gaara was able to walk up to Sirius without being accosted. Sirius tried to lean forward and hug him, so Gaara took a swift step backwards to dodge it.

 

“Oh, of course.” He smiled. “How are you,… Gaara?” He clearly wanted to call him Lily, but with the crowd of adults and children watching them unabashedly, he felt it was probably not a safe idea right now.

 

Gaara nodded, as if to say he was alright, as he had a hundred times, before pointing at Sirius, silently asking the same.

 

“Oh, I’m fine, I… hold on, I heard you can talk now…” He stared at Gaara for a long moment and then slumped his shoulders before laughing. “Nicely done, my good sir.”

 

Gaara smiled a little, but quashed it when he remembered the onlookers.

 

“I would love to talk to you properly now, but I need to have a chat with Harry first. Could you go and wait over with Remus for a minute? He’s by the lockers. Just look for the space where nobody will stand within three metres of him.”

 

Gaara nodded and wandered on over to where he remembered the lockers were.

 

Remus was trying to maintain a low profile, but no matter how much the students had loved having him teach them, he was still a werewolf and a dangerous creature. After what a number of newspaper articles had said, no one was sure if he was even born a human anymore.

 

Still, they all eagerly watched the brave saviour of Hogwarts approach the killer beast without batting an eye. He just ambled on over, leaned against the locker and nodded his greeting.

 

Meanwhile, all good cheer had left Sirius as he was finally able to greet Harry as a free man. And he had no good news for him.

 

Harry didn’t avoid Sirius’ bony hug, instead he embraced it with a big smile. He had been one of the last off the train since he was nervous about meeting his godfather again and also because he didn’t want to be near Gaara for a second longer than he needed to.

 

“Come on, I need to talk to you in private.” Sirius said, his smile coming and going depending on whether he was actually looking at James’ son.

 

They pushed through the crowd to the deserted end of the platform and Sirius turned back to Harry and his smile didn’t come back.

 

“There’s not an easy way to tell you this, I’m afraid. The Ministry won’t let me take care of you, Harry. I’m so sorry.”

 

Harry’s mouth went dry and his knees felt week. He couldn’t believe it. It couldn’t be true!

 

Sirius saw Harry’s utter shock and had to avert his eyes. “I’ve been fighting with them all week, but the Wizengamot have ruled that because of my diminished mental capacity after staying in Azkaban, I can’t look after both you and Gaara.”

 

Harry said the first thing that came into his head, “So you’re taking Gaara to live with you?”

 

“I want to look after both of you, of course I want you to live with me, Harry. But you have your relatives, I know you don’t like them, but Gaara has no one really.” It broke both of their hearts. “I will keep fighting this, but, for this summer at least, you will have to go back with your aunt and uncle.”

 

Sirius spotted an Auror and a Ministry official watching from afar. There to make sure he didn’t just abscond with Harry anyway.

 

“I only found out this morning, their final verdict, otherwise I would have told you sooner. Harry, I’m so so sorry.” The man had spent the last twelve years having his happiest memories eaten by monster, and yet he still felt as wretched as he ever had. Both of them were close to tears.

 

“So, I have to go back with Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon and I won’t even get to see you?”

 

“No, of course you will. You can come and visit. You _will_ come and visit. You can stay for a week at a time, twice over the holiday!” Sirius desperately wanted to cling to the enthusiasm and optimism that thought conjured.

 

Sirius couldn’t tell Harry the whole truth sadly. This wasn’t really about Sirius’ state of mind. This was because he had caused a massive amount of trouble for the Ministry already, and because Gaara was dangerous. When he had first petitioned for guardianship, he had been denied Gaara and allowed Harry.

 

He found out that they intended to send Gaara to a special, newly opened orphanage for gifted wizarding children. Except, such an institute did not exist and was in all likelihood a front for the Department of Mysteries or another Ministry division. They wanted to take ownership of the weapon called Gaara and find out what made him tick.

 

Over the course of the week, he had fought and argued, and eventually he had threatened to go to the press and to become a thorn in the Ministry’s side unless they agreed to his terms. He would not give any interviews about the injustice he suffered, he would receive a rather modest financial settlement rather than the vast sum of compensation he might have been awarded for the miscarriage of justice; and in return he would be given custody of Harry and Gaara. He felt it was pretty fair of him.

 

He had been told, resolutely, no. They could feasibly cede control of one massive political chit, but not two (especially when one was also a weapon of mass destruction). He had to decide one or the other.

 

Harry needed him, clearly more than Gaara actually needed a guardian, and he had promised James and Lily that he would look after their son if they couldn’t. But whereas Harry would suffer staying with his relatives, Gaara might disappear into the Ministry’s clutches or else become an enemy of the state by rebelling against their control.

 

Sirius couldn’t condemn his friend and liberator to the same nomadic, hellish existence he had suffered through this past year on the run.

 

So, he had claimed Gaara and they had hammered out the rest of the details. He was only allowed two, non-consecutive unsupervised visits from or with Harry, otherwise he had to request a formal, supervised visit at the Dursley’s home. Or else he had to restrict himself to written communications. During any visits to or by Harry, Remus could not be present, and they strongly intimated that the werewolf should not take up residence alongside Gaara, even if they couldn’t outright demand it.

 

They had wanted him to sign away any legal right he had to custody over Harry, to formalise this agreement, but he rejected that entirely. He would never set this travesty in stone. He would continue to fight.

 

In the meantime, he had talked to Molly and Arthur Weasley and managed to persuade them to take Harry for the latter half of the summer, including and following the World Cup. He would have Harry visit him for ten days early in the holiday, and then he could take him to the World Cup and see him a couple times after that.

 

It was so far from perfect, but at least Harry would know he wasn’t alone anymore.

 

In spirit.

 

He explained all of these plans, if not the truths behind them, to Harry in the hope that he might alleviate some of the visible suffering. Harry faked a smile, and thanked him. Sirius wanted to spend longer there, talking to Harry properly, but he noticed in the corner of his eye the Ministry worker was tapping his watch. Clearly they had been ordered to cut any contact between Sirius and Harry short.

 

Sirius wished he could explain this all to Harry’s satisfaction, but even if he hadn’t agreed not to as part of the deal, he didn’t know if wanted to expose his godson to that sort of corruption. He was a teenager but he was clearly still so innocent and ignorant of some of the world’s evils. The same as Dumbledore, Sirius didn’t want Harry to believe no adult could be trusted. Not yet.

 

He guided Harry by the shoulder back to the platform barrier and went through it with him. He wouldn’t relinquish a single moment with Harry until he was in the car on his way “home”.

 

Sirius took Vernon Dursely aside for a moment to say a few choice words with the man where the Ministry worker and the Auror could not hear him. Vernon went from purple with rage at the presumption of this ‘freak’ to pale and shaken. By the time the walrus had clambered into his car, he had taken to heart what Harry’s protective godfather had told him.

 

Frankly, it was as well that the Auror had been so far away, as some of the threats Sirius had levelled alone might have sent him back to prison.

 

He walked back to the platform to retrieve Gaara and Remus. He snarled as he walked past the Ministry lackeys, just following orders, as they verified Harry Potter had left with his relatives before they too left.

 

Sirius had been told it would be ill-advised and might upset people in the Ministry if ‘it’ (Remus) came to live with him and Gaara. Sirius had promptly invited Moony to move in with him the next time he saw him.

 

Remus had a family home elsewhere so he declined, but he was grateful nonetheless and promised to visit or stay often. If only to give Sirius some company that wasn’t Gaara.

 

Gaara was a good person, but not a great companion after months and years of isolation.

 

When he saw Gaara and Remus, his devastation lifted for a moment, seeing his two friends ready to return with him to his home.

 

Meanwhile, Harry was in his uncle’s car, fighting back tears that he didn’t want to shed in front of the man, wondering what Sirius had said to stop his uncle from performing the same tirade on the way back from King’s Cross about how ungrateful he was, how freakish he and his kind were, or how busy his summer was going to be with chores. None of it. Petunia was concerned.

 

Harry just counted in his head how many days until his first trip to see Sirius.

 

He couldn’t stop his mind turning to jealousy at the thought that Gaara, of all people, had taken his place with his godfather. It was not fair!

 

“Alright, let’s get going!” Sirius cheered, a smile set on his face that didn’t reach his eyes. Remus had done him the courtesy of explaining Harry’s absence to Gaara. He led the pair out through the barrier, past the gawking witches and wizards, and into the muggle car park. 

 

Gaara was expecting a ‘taxi’ about which he had been told, or the infamous Knight Bus, both championing Sirius’s ongoing support of anything pure-bloods hated. Instead, the man had gone a step further.

 

“You see, I used to have a wonderful motorcycle, but around twelve years ago I lent it to a guy to give someone a lift to Surrey and I never saw it again. Finally managed to track him and it down recently and it’s knackered. Turns out he didn’t know it was needed oil put in it!” Sirius said. Lupin was glad. That bike had been a death trap, and that sidecar meant he insisted everyone he knew had to be given a ride at least once.

 

James had loved the thing until Lily had told him he wasn’t allowed on or in it anymore.

 

Remus had quietly asked if she would forbid him too.

 

“Anyway, since I’m in the family way now, I decided to go ahead and spend my vast sums of family money on something I just know will make my parents turn in their graves, wherever they are.” He declared, presenting them with a…

 

“You bought a car?” Remus stated.

 

“Yeah, isn’t it wonderful!”

 

It certainly was a sight to behold. Remus knew more about the muggle world than most wizards tended to, but he couldn’t name the sleek black car. He only knew from its general shape and design, not to mention the buyer, that it was likely very fancy and incredibly fast.

 

“It’s the fastest one the man at the shop sold.” Sirius went on.

 

Of course it was…

 

Gaara had seen these ‘cars’ before, when he was in London last and when he was travelling around the country. They were wonderfully useful inventions for civilians, he thought. Of what little he could gleam about their inner workings, Kankuro would absolutely love to tinker with one of them.

 

Gaara didn’t know how much one of these mechanical carriages cost, but if he could find a way to get back to his world, he might see if he could take Sirius’ with him. Sirius would just have to talk to the carriage makers and get a replacement. Branding was a new concept to the desert-dweller, but he figured Sirius shouldn’t have any trouble getting a replacement from Mr. Rolls-Royce.

 

Strange name.

 

As Gaara crawled into the back seat of the carriage, safe in the knowledge that his sand would protect him, a much more nervous lycanthrope climbed into the front seat and asked, “Sirius, you do have a driver’s license, don’t you?”

 

“Of course, don’t you remember I got my license when Lily got pregnant and wouldn’t let me drive you, her or James without one, Moony?”

 

“Yes, I also remember that _that_ license was drawn in crayon by James, and Lily hexed you when you finally showed it to her.”

 

“Yep, that’s the one.” Sirius turned on the engine and gave it a few loud revs.

 

“I think I might just walk instead, Padfoot. It’s such a nice day.”

 

“Nonesense, Moony. Lily isn’t making a fuss, is he?” Sirius said, jabbing his thumb at Gaara who had been enjoying the very comfortable leather seats up until that point.

 

“Well, unlike Lily, I don’t have an automatic shield of sand to protect me when you crash this thing.”

 

“I have never crash- Lily, I’ve never crashed once, I swear.”

 

Gaara was getting more and more upset as they went on, but they couldn’t see him from the front, so they continued.

 

“Lily, don’t believe a word he says. He crashed his bike at least four times because I saw him do it all four times. Probably did it a dozen times more when I wasn’t around.”

 

“Rubbish! See, I’ve been driving for five minutes and I haven’t even bumped another car or taken a wing mirror off. I used to hit them every time I drove, you remember.”

 

“We’ve just left the car park and we’re now stuck in traffic. I’m more worried when you get to a main road. I would have started casting spells if I thought you were going to go on the motorway.”

 

“Can you hear this, Lily? He has no faith in me!”

 

“My name’s not Lily, it’s Gaara!” The irate red-head said a touch louder than his monotonous, gravelly voice usually sounded.

 

“Ha!” Sirius declared. “Pay up.” He held out his hand and Lupin dropped a handful of coins into his palm.

 

“You couldn’t even make it to his house, Gaara?” Remus said, tucking his lighter wallet back into his robes.

 

Gaara was still angry, doubly so to have been tricked.

 

This was going to be one long summer.

 

 

0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0

 

Omake:

 

Luna had been happy when Gaara and Draco had overcome their quarrel. Draco didn’t like her that much but he was a good friend to Gaara so she didn’t mind. She had been even happier when she found out that the reason for their reconciliation had been Draco’s discovery of Gaara’s fluffy little secret. Finally someone with which she could actually discuss it with.

 

Gaara hated talking about his transformations.

 

However, no matter how fortuitous the end of their argument was, it had come too late for one event in particular: Draco’s birthday, June 5th.

 

Draco had worked so hard to organise a birthday party for Gaara, she only thought it right that Gaara reciprocate, even if it was weeks after the actual date. But since she knew he wasn’t very good at things like parties (or friendships) she had resolved to help him as best she could.

 

Admittedly, the only two birthday parties she had been invited to recently were Gaara’s this year and Ginny’s party two years ago just before they both joined the school. Ever since, Ginny either didn’t have parties or she just wasn’t inviting Luna anymore.

 

It was okay, Luna still believed Ginny was her friend.

 

But Luna still thought she would be able to come up with something to celebrate Draco’s birthday. And then, miracle of miracles, she saw that Gaara had been trying to organise one already himself. He hadn’t gotten very far. Clearly he had even less experience with parties than Luna did. Plus every time he tried to approach one of Draco’s other Slytherin friends, they ran away in terror.

 

It was upon seeing that spectacle happen the fourth time that she stepped in to help, secretly.

 

While keeping out of his sight, Luna went about setting up a party for a boy who didn’t like her, to help a boy she liked.

 

Soon enough she had it all set up, and had to trick Gaara into turning up, while she personally gave Draco his invitation. As she walked back to her room, she hoped Gaara would play along and claim that he had organised the whole thing, or at least stayed until Draco arrived.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Omake 2:

 

“I’m taking Fluffy.” Gaara said, standing in Hagrid’s cluttered hut.

 

“Fluffy? Taking him where?”

 

“To Sirius’ home.”

 

“You can’t take Fluffy there. He’s mine, for one.”

 

“He’s mine.” Gaara calmly rebutted.

 

“No he’s not. I bought him off a chap at the pub.”

 

“You left him in the woods and I found him. He’s mine now.”

 

“Now see here, you can’t just take him. And will Sirius’ house even have enough space? Fluffy needs room to run around.” Hagrid knew Gaara was difficult to deal with so he tried not to get upset.

 

“I will make room for him.”

 

“Have you even asked Sirius if you can bring a giant three-headed dog with you?”

 

Gaara paused at this. He hadn’t thought to but perhaps it was one of those things he was supposed to do to be polite. “I have not.”

 

“Well, before you go taking any of my pets, you should probably check with your guardian whether you’re allowed to have them.”

 

Hagrid said this safe in the knowledge that there were perhaps four people in the world, including himself, that would agree to take in a fully grown Cerberus and Sirius Black was most certainly not one of them. Evidently, that number had grown to five with Gaara. Either way, there was no way Gaara would be allowed to take Fluffy home with him.

 

If Gaara wanted to tell himself that Fluffy belonged to him, that was fine. It was lovely that the boy cared so much about Fluffy, really.

 

_ _ _ _ _

 

‘ _Lily,_

_No, Fluffy cannot come here. He’s a giant three-headed hellhound and my place is a townhouse in a busy neighbourhood. Don’t steal any other of Hagrid’s pets either._

_Looking forward to seeing you,_

_Yours sincerely,_

_Padfoot_ ’

 

Gaara crumpled up the reply and went to kill some acromantulas. It would be harder to relieve his stresses around here now that the dementors were all gone. He would have to be careful he didn’t accidentally wipe out the giant spiders too and leave himself with no other outlet.

 

Maybe he could pick off a couple Hufflepuffs without anybody noticing…

 

While he was on his way to hunt down spiders, he just happened to wander past Fluffy’s area and ended up spending most of the day there. So invested in training the dumb dog, Gaara forgot entirely that he had walked into the forest during his lunch break and by the time he walked back out he had missed the rest of the day’s classes and half of dinner.


	14. Epilogue

“Here we are! Home, sweet home.” Sirius declared as he pulled up outside one among the row of connected houses and let Lupin and Gaara disembark with the redhead’s trunk. Sirius darted off in his shiny black auto-mobile carriage to park it up the street, and jogged back at a sedate pace.

 

Looking up, Gaara didn’t like the place. These “cities”, much bigger than even the grandest towns in his own world, were densely packed with thousands upon thousands of civilians, most of whom seemed to drive cars all over the streets. As he peered up at the terrace of town houses, he thought they too seemed quite cramped.

 

The good cheer on Sirius’ face, which had returned over the course of the slow drive through London, diminished with each step the man took towards his front door. Clearly he had been trying to put on a brave face for Gaara’s sake. Gaara thought he could see why when they entered the house.

 

It was disgusting.

 

Every surface, including the walls, was covered in some unspecific grime. With the perfectly straight face Lupin was forcing himself to maintain, Gaara believed they had a consensus that Sirius’ family home could only be an improvement from living in a cave or possibly the Shrieking Shack. Low standards, indeed.

 

Gaara understood that after twelve years of imprisonment, it was to be expected that a certain amount of dust would accumulate in a vacant house, but this looked like a group of homeless people had taken up residence (and must have had some grudge against the homeowner). Gaara considered asking after such a possibility but that would most likely come under the category of impolite questions that Temari had tried to explain were inappropriate to ask out loud.

 

It had taken him a frustratingly long time to work out that asking women how old they were wasn’t an empathetic sign of his interest in their lives as intended, but instead it was somehow rude. Worse yet when he tried guessing.

 

If Gaara was honest, he still didn’t quite understand the rules for these things but Temari had said (very loudly) that if he was unsure or if it was about something negative, he was better off staying quiet.

 

This past year had certainly proved that many, though not all, misunderstandings could be avoided by not speaking.

 

Gaara could hear Sirius cursing his family for situating their house in a muggle area as he struggled to lift Gaara’s trunk up the steps to his front door. Gaara would have gone back to help but Sirius was almost there and he would feel a much greater sense of accomplishment if he managed it on his own.

 

Lupin was already moving further into the dark hallway, cleverly avoiding the walls and whatever was clinging to them (or growing from them). Gaara was about to follow suit and show himself around the dirty house but Sirius quietly, wheezing, told him to stay there.

 

Sirius was wondering if there was a simple spell he could perform to heal what he suspected was a hernia, or if he was going to need a potion and a lie down on a flat surface.

 

“Stay there, Gaara. Kreacher!” Sirius yelled.

 

Gaara was startled by the sudden shout. He’d been called a lot of things: “monster”, “demon”, “murderer”, “abomination”, “short”, and any number of other unsavoury titles that each held an ounce of truth, but for Sirius to loudly declare that Gaara was a ‘creature’ was unexpected. Still, he knew Sirius well enough to give him the benefit of the doubt.

 

The explanation Gaara had been anticipating came in the form of a house elf popping into the dim hallway, presumably answering Sirius’ call.

 

“Mistress’ ungrateful, treacherous, no-good son has brought more filth into mistress’ noble house.” The house elf loudly muttered under its breath. Gaara thought it was quite the commitment that Sirius had styled his house elf to complement the filthy, rundown house. And apparently it had a dirty mouth to match.

 

“Kreacher!” Sirius admonished the unpleasant slave. “This is Gaara, my new ward. You will treat him with respect!”

 

Kreacher observed the newest intruder into his mistress’ hallowed home but instead of yet another half-blood or blood traitor, this boy gave him pause. He was wrong. He felt wrong. Like he was a dangerous predator and an old friend. But since Kreacher didn’t have friends, he knew that whatever this boy was, he was another insult to his beloved mistress.

 

“Yes, ungrateful brat-master. Kreacher will serve _It_.”

 

Sirius pulled back his arm as if to backhand the uppity slave, but restrained himself. He may have rejected everything his parents had taught him, but a few lessons had sunk in too deep; table manners and not hitting the servants in front of company, chief amongst them.

 

“This is Kreacher, Gaara. A keepsake from my mother and almost as ill-tempered as the old battleaxe.”

 

“Ungrateful, blood traitor son shouldn’t speak ill of the mistress like that.” Kreacher continued to mumble, perfectly audible.

 

“Don’t pay him or his spiteful words any mind; thing’s even crazier than my inbred cousin, Bellatrix. And you, you miserable little beast, you’ll leave Gaara alone. No little tricks or traps. If he so much as falls down the stairs, I’ll take Remus’ advice and give you clothes and be done with you.”

 

Kreacher’s ear swivelled back in either fear or anger. “Master’s pet beast brings shame to the master’s noble and ancient name.”

 

“Be gone with you now, I’ve had enough of your vile tongue for one day!”

 

Kreacher popped away after one more glance at the Black family ward.

 

With a title like Ward of the House of Black, Gaara was as good as a bastard of the family, which meant he would be much safer from the dangerously insane little elf than Remus had been on his first visit the week before. Despite Lupin’s later suggested threat of freeing the servant, the werewolf had been the one to stop Sirius from murdering Kreacher.

 

The house elf had tried to kill Lupin with a very sharp, cursed knife, placed where the man would find it. Fortunately Sirius had been nearby but he had then beaten the smaller creature and was going to kill him until Lupin interceded.

 

Needless to say, Sirius had entirely run out of patience for his childhood tormentor. The spiteful mumbling he could take but threats to his friends he could not.

 

It soon became apparent to Gaara that Sirius hated this house even more than the redhead did as the man said Gaara was free to explore the building on his own, though he did forbid a couple of rooms as they were filled with dangerous cursed items.

 

Sirius winced as he walked to the kitchen, planning to borrow some of the pain potion his decrepit friend kept on hand. Remus claimed he only carried it because before and after the full moon his body went through immense strain, but Sirius knew he had it on him all through the month and dipped into his supply when the moon was entirely dark in the sky.

 

Gaara shrugged off his rude friend and went to look around without the host to guide him. As was to be expected, the house held little of interest to Gaara beyond the impressive personal library on the second floor. Though, while he wouldn’t claim an interest, Gaara did take note of the mounted house elf heads above the staircase up to the first floor. Even he found that unsettling.

 

Other than the library, he found a few bedrooms, one or two bathrooms, and a couple of rooms filled to the brim with junk that Gaara assumed were the ones Sirius had told him not to enter.

 

He would have gone for a stroll outside to get his bearings but Sirius had warned him in the car that the house had been heavily warded by his father and it would be safer if Gaara didn’t try to enter or leave the house unescorted. Gaara was not happy about that; even the Malfoys hadn’t placed such restrictions on him.

 

Gaara walked back down the stairs to the library on the second floor and settled in for the long haul. He would need to assess what sorts of resources he had at his disposal here since he sincerely doubted Sirius knew offhand what books his family owned (or that the man had even entered the library since his release).

 

He picked up a stack of books and sat on the floor, not trusting the rotted chair in the corner, and started to read whatever contents pages he could find for information on his so far fruitless search for his home world. The size of the library was nothing compared to Hogwarts’ but the collection of books he suspected were concerning dark magics was much higher. Hogwarts had very few truly dark magic books even in the restricted section, presumably having been cleared out for the students’ sakes.

 

An hour after Gaara sat down, Sirius poked his head around the door. “He is here.” 

 

“I told you he would be.”

 

“I have to say, Gaara, I had thought you might come back down to join us after you wandered around.” Sirius was smiling but he was a little miffed.

 

“Did you need me for something?” Gaara asked.

 

Sirius was stumped. “Umm, well, I suppose I don’t… Remus?”

 

Lupin entered the room after Sirius. “Gaara, I understand that you would like to continue your research, and Sirius and I will do all that we can to help you get home, but it’s not healthy to shut yourself up in a dusty library every day.”

 

Gaara agreed, but held that getting home was more important than his immediate health. Plus, it couldn’t be that bad for him, he had done this sort of thing before when he had been put on leave after the Konoha-Suna war, and he had been perfectly fine. As he recalled it, he had spent a full week in the Kazekage Mansion’s library, leaving only to visit the bathroom.

 

It didn’t occur to Gaara that his brother and sister had visited him there every day with food, fresh clothes and helped to clean up after him, opening the curtains and windows so that his eyes didn’t become strained and he got some fresh air. In his mind, back then, they had been irritatingly clingy after the war and his change of heart about murdering innocent people.

 

Gaara nodded noncommittally at Remus and turned back to his latest book. This place was looking to be a treasure trove with all of the potential avenues of research he could follow. Clearly, despite the bad reputation, dark magic was the path to his salvation.

 

Over the next week, Gaara was dragged out of the library at meal times and every other night Lupin would order Gaara to go to his room to sleep. Worse, when Sirius was bored he would come and sit in the library and bother Gaara. It was a dangerous game and Sirius knew it.

 

It was a strange dynamic they unconsciously developed, with Gaara the teenager unable (or unwilling) to take care of himself, Sirius as the goofy adult looking to connect, and Remus the ‘temporary’ houseguest attempting to keep both of the idiots alive.

 

His bedroom had still been filthy when he went to sleep there for the first time so instead he had spent the night cleaning it. Gaara didn’t like cleaning.

 

Over the course of that first week in Grimmauld Place, owing to the state of the house, the continual insults and Kreacher calling Gaara ‘It’ every time they crossed paths, Gaara had ended up saying some distinctly threatening things to the house elf one afternoon. As a result, unless Sirius directly ordered Kreacher to be in the same room with Gaara, the servant had begun to avoid the Jinchūriki like the plague.

 

Sirius would have done something about it but honestly he was just impressed. He would have killed for the secret of how to get rid of Kreacher when he was Gaara’s age.

 

During one of the many nights Sirius sat annoying Gaara by talking (and breathing) around him, Sirius finally asked about Gaara’s extraordinary powers. “Surely not everybody in your home world can do what you can, can they?”

 

Gaara sighed and marked his place. “I am stronger than some, but there are others much stronger I am. I am the only one who can control sand the way I do.”

 

Sirius couldn’t believe that. He loved Gaara, he really did, but he could scarcely imagine such a being could exist in any world. “You don’t have to be modest, Gaara…”

 

“I am not being modest. There are shinobi in my world that could defeat me in moments.” Of course, those shinobi could probably be counted on Gaara’s digits. Pretty much the four Kage, a couple of particularly powerful shinobi and the rumoured S-rank nuke-nin organising somewhere near Ame. Gaara was the strongest in Suna, with perhaps one or two retired exceptions, and as a high Jounin-level combatant, there really weren’t that many who could beat him.

 

Sirius was plainly struggling to accept this truth so Gaara waited. He knew as soon as he reopened his book, Sirius would reengage him.

 

“You’re so young; are all of these other people, who are stronger than you, are they the same age?”

 

“No, they’re all older than I am, I believe.” The only one even close to his age was about nine months older than he was, as far as he knew. October 10th.

 

“How did you come to be so strong, then? I’m trying to wrap my head around it, but I just don’t understand. Here, a wizard might have a talent for magic, but never has there been a fifteen year old who could defeat grown, trained wizards. Not Dumbeldore, not Merlin, not even You-Know-Who, as far as I know.”

 

This was a more difficult question. Gaara would likely have been a very powerful shinobi from birth, with his Kage lineage and strong siblings; but he would be lying if he said that his strength was from his birth, or that it was as a result of training (what little he had indulged in). He didn’t like lying to Sirius.

 

“I have had certain gifts from birth that others do not have.” Though, ‘gift’ was stretching it.

 

“Your world must be a very strange place.” Sirius said, imagining a world where a teenager could develop such abilities. A place that could lead to Gaara’s stunted emotional development. He had an intuition that he would never get the chance, but even if he were offered, he didn’t think he would ever want to see that world.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

‘ _Dear Harry,_

_I’m glad to hear that your relatives are taking it easier on you. If they cause you any problems, I can always send them a nice friendly letter. Just make sure you don’t tell them I was acquitted. And I’m sure your results will be fine. Ms Granger was helping you and Ronald, and she seemed to be exceptionally bright. They’re released in August so best not to think too much about them yet._

_It is very quiet here today. Remus is out doing something or other, I’m not sure what. And Gaara hardly leaves the library. He would have been better off in Ravenclaw, I think. My schedule is a bit boring these days. I mostly sit around or bother Gaara. He said he would do some very ungrateful things if I didn’t entertain myself for a while so I thought I would reply to this morning’s letter._

_I can’t go out in public at the moment. If I go the Alley, I get mobbed by people wanting autographs or money, and if I try going into muggle London I’ll get arrested. The Minister never got around to telling the muggle PM to call off the manhunt for me. If you want to know how I found this out, I’ll tell you when I see you. I think some of the scenes would be better acted out._

_You’ll be visiting in a couple of weeks, what foods do you want Kreacher to make for you? Your room here will be cleaned by the time you arrive (and not a second before!)_

_The next match between Transylvania and Haiti is going to be brutal, make sure you don’t miss it. The last time those two faced each other in the World Cup, only one player from the Haitian team made it out alive. Although, from what I hear, half of the Transylvanian team was dead to begin with._

_I’m gonna finish here as I want to set up my new trap for Remus before he gets back. I’ll tell you how it went and what I did in my next letter._

_Yours sincerely,_

_Sirius Orion Black (lucky S.O.B)_

_Of the Most Ancient and Noble House of Black, etcetera._ ’

 

After that was a rather sizable and elaborate crest that Sirius stamped at the bottom of all of his letters, even if the crest took up more space than his godfather’s often short messages. At the very bottom of the page, after the ridiculous crest, Sirius included a post-script:

 

‘ _p.s. If your uncle gives you any more trouble over your radio, tell him I will set Remus on him. Muggles are terrified of werewolves as well, right?_ ’

 

Harry didn’t intend to do that since he had already levelled the threat of a mass murderer on them and any further scares might just hasten his aunt’s inevitable mental breakdown. They hadn’t given him any more trouble since Sirius had a word with Vernon, so Harry just relaxed and lamented his poor luck. Right now he could be helping prank Professor Lupin rather than reading a letter.

 

Sirius had been sending letters at least every other day, sometimes twice a day, giving Hedwig more of a workout than she appreciated.

 

The Dursleys, despite the looming fear of Sirius Black, had wanted to object to the frequent, noticeable flights of Hedwig to and from their house. They couldn’t very well go admitting to their freakish, criminal nephew having such a strange and exotic pet and them allowing it free roam about the place. It had eventually led to Petunia telling all of their nosy neighbours that the owl was a rare and endangered breed and had taken up nesting in the Dursley’s loft because of its exceptional state of cleanliness. Sadly, they couldn’t remove it by law.

 

As disgustingly abnormal as it was to have a wild animal living in their loft, it was the best alternative to the truth. The neighbours dutifully pretended to be awed by the special circumstances and Petunia pretended to be pleased. It all ended with tea and cakes and a few backhanded compliments.

 

Vernon was still mad as all hell about it so Harry had taken waiting until nightfall to send his replies so Hedwig wasn’t spotted too often. Especially since owls were supposed to be nocturnal. Luckily, it seemed no one on Privet Drive knew anything about ornithology, despite the few older gentlemen that had claimed to be bird watchers at local barbecues, had bought some expensive binoculars and other paraphernalia, and had yet to actually go out and watch birds.

 

Draco had sent Gaara two letters in their first week off, and a third by the time Gaara deigned to respond, which was shorter than any of Draco’s long and cursive messages. Luna also sent one, which wound up being over eleven pages long and filled with many anecdotes that might have suggested she could benefit from a visit to St. Mungo’s mind magic specialists.

 

He had sent both replies halfway through the second week of the holiday. Gaara’s response to Luna hadn’t reached a full page despite his efforts to pad it out. He had done very little worth reporting. She had appreciated the effort nonetheless.

 

Draco had not.

 

Gaara had simply taken the opportunity to send them when he had a moment’s peace from Sirius’ needy interruptions or Remus’ attempts to make him more comfortable. Remus was taking Sirius to Diagon Alley to get his new wand that afternoon and Kreacher would stay out of sight, meaning Gaara was alone for a change and had free reign of the house.

 

He might have waited until something else of interest came up to write about, but Draco’s third letter was already starting to sound upset. Plus the full moon was tomorrow so he figured he should write now or else Luna would expect some description. Such things, pertaining to his transformations, were not pertinent.

 

As soon as Gaara had sent off the two owls (Sirius’ and Remus’) to the two addresses, he had gone to the kitchen for a glass of water. If Kreacher weren’t deadly afraid of him, he could have ordered the house elf to fetch him things and do menial tasks like sending off the owls, but with the way the deformed little servant had spoken to Gaara that first week he hadn’t been able to restrain himself or his words.

 

He wasn’t that good at creative threats so he had just listened in on what Shukaku had been screaming at the time. It had done the trick and more.

 

He heard the door open and shut, signalling his guardian’s return, so he was about to leave his glass of water and make a break for the stairs. With his speed and stealth, he should have been able to make past the hallway without either of the grown men seeing him. They had been bugging him to venture outside with them since he arrived, and while he had been allowed out a few times with supervision, during the night when no one would see him, they insisted he should go on an outing with them during the day. Somewhere “fun”…

 

Hence why he was avoiding them as much as he could during the daylight hours.

 

His hand was on the kitchen doorknob when he heard the screeching that started up by the front door. Suspecting an attack, Gaara continued to wrench the door open and run into the hallway. Instead of an attacking witch or a banshee, Gaara watched as the two responsible adults in his life wrestled with drapery.

 

They were trying to pull the curtains back over the painting that sat, pride of place, in the foyer. Evidently the painting was enchanted or cursed and would scream profanity at anyone nearby until the curtains were closed again.

 

It seemed like a fitting decoration for the morbid house.

 

Gaara approached to offer some help. Sirius and Remus both were visibly struggling with the drapes, one from his emaciation and the other with the pre-transformation pains.

 

Together the trio were able to draw the curtains, but not before Gaara suffered a number of insults to his appearance and blood purity. The blood purity he could live without, but he didn’t think it necessary for the painting to denigrate how he looked. Plus, he didn’t think he was _that_ short.

 

“Sorry about that.” Sirius huffed in between breaths. Perhaps Gaara should implement some sort of recovery workout regimen for the free man to bring him up to a basic level of fitness. It would be nice not to hear the man struggling to breathe every time he climbed a single set of stairs. “That, Gaara, was my mother. Or at least her likeness.”

 

Gaara glanced back at the covered portrait and wondered what he could say without insulting his friend’s mother. That was definitely not allowed.

 

He had paused too long, it seemed, as Sirius continued speaking. “She wasn’t always so… Well, she was never a kind woman, but that portrait was commissioned during her more… after my… it was painted when she was in a particularly bad mood, shall we say.”

 

“Fake mothers screaming insults. I can relate.” Gaara mumbled.

 

“What?” Sirius asked, not catching it.

 

“Nothing.” Gaara murmured as he continued to the stairs. He would venture down to dinner tonight.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

It had been on Gaara’s mind for weeks, how he would navigate the issue of his lunar indisposition with Sirius around. Lupin would obviously leave for a deserted area where he could change and hunt without the risk of killing or (worse) infecting innocent people. But that left Sirius.

 

Gaara had planned to hide in the attic that Sirius had yet to re-enter since returning to the house, if Sirius had not told Gaara that he was going to accompany Lupin to the New Forest for the night. For once, neither adult insisted that Gaara should go with them on their outing.

 

Not wanting to risk anything close to what had transpired last month, Remus had downed the little bottle of Wolfsbane potion and proceeded to remind Gaara and Sirius every five minutes that he had taken it, as if to assure himself he had indeed taken it. It had worn on Gaara’s nerves quickly.

 

“And you know who to floo if there’s a problem, right?” Sirius asked.

 

Gaara nodded absently.

 

“And Kreacher is somewhere around here if you need anything.”

 

Gaara nodded again.

 

Sirius was apparently having a parental moment, and felt the stirrings of worry about leaving the fifteen year old on his own in the house. Entirely irrational, most would agree, since Gaara was more than capable of looking after himself (for a _whole_ night).

 

‘At least,’ Gaara thought, ‘Sirius hasn’t tried to hire a babysitter.’

 

 _That_ would _not_ have ended well.

 

When the adults had left and while Kreacher was nowhere to be found, Gaara settled in his room for the night. He couldn’t risk the mad elf spotting him from afar and mistaking him for a wild animal that needed to be exterminated so he had to stay locked up in his room. House elves, especially deranged ones, could be quite resourceful and extremely dangerous.

 

Of the transformation and night, little should be noted except Gaara’s usual animalistic restlessness in being cooped up and his attempts to wile away the night reading another boring book. Truly, the only moment of interest that the shinobi-turned-tanuki was involved in was shortly before his change back in the morning, as he was nearing the last chapter of his book, the door burst open and he looked up to see Sirius stood in the door, staring at him.

 

…

 

…

 

“Uhhh…” Sirius wasn’t sure what he was looking at.

 

He was supporting Remus who was limp but conscious and hanging off of Sirius’ straining shoulder. The householder had made it up one set of stairs with Remus but he needed a little help with getting the man up the next. Instead of the physically compact yet strong foreigner sleeping or, more likely, reading in his room, he had found a suspiciously familiar animal lying on the bed, wrapped in blankets, staring right back at him and ignoring the book sat in its paws.

 

Before Sirius could even begin to draw the obvious conclusions (and the more convoluted ones, for that matter), and before Gaara could think to make a break for it or try to incapacitate one or both of the exhausted adults, his body shifted and suddenly he was human and had some explaining to do.

 

“Uhhh…” Lupin agreed.

 

Gaara didn’t have any words at the moment. His control now re-established and without a movement, his sand zipped out and slammed the door shut.

 

Sirius turned to his heavy friend, “Well… that was unexpected.”

 

“Don’t look at me, Sirius, I didn’t know about it.” Remus said.

 

So shocked, Sirius almost dropped the dead weight on his shoulder. Cursing, he struggled onwards, not expecting any help from their secretive younger friend. He was too tired to be dealing with this.

 

He would have preferred to come back and find Gaara had thrown a party and trashed the house (not that it would have made much of a difference to the dump), like Sirius would have (and did) at his age.

 

Sirius dropped off his semi-permanent houseguest and wandered back to his room. He probably should have checked in with Gaara now, but he was so tired, and he sensed it was a discussion that would benefit from the presence of a well-rested Lupin. Sirius settled on his bed and went to sleep too.

 

Gaara had emerged from his blankets after the door was firmly shut and pulled on his clothes. This was not good. This wasn’t the fear of death or of loss, this was the fear of imminent humiliation. He sneaked up to both of the adults’ rooms only to find they weren’t huddled and snickering about Gaara but were thankfully both asleep.

 

He gave serious thought to leaving the house and hiding out at Draco’s or somewhere else for the rest of the summer to avoid the inevitable embarrassment. He would break right through the wards if he had to. He didn’t know how wards worked but he was sure he would find a way through it need be.

 

(Little did Gaara know, the wards had been set to allow Gaara through since he arrived, but Lupin had warned Sirius that Gaara would come and go without warning or permission unless he didn’t think he could. Sirius knew it was manipulative but he was more concerned about Gaara’s wellbeing than his own ethics. No matter how formidable the boy was, it wasn’t safe for a teenager to go roaming around London, or anywhere else, at the times that Gaara tended to. So they had lied.)

 

Gaara had decided to tough it out by the time he heard stirring upstairs. He hadn’t been able to get back into his book so he had visited Shukaku briefly, not for advice but to check up on the beast and make sure no other alterations in his seal had occurred and to distract himself.

 

Needless to say, that trip into his mind had been a mistake. Shukaku had taken enormous pleasure in mocking Gaara in all things, especially his tanuki transformation, and wasted no time in commencing the mind games when Gaara appeared. The one-tailed monster had droned on about how Gaara’s friends would abandon him in this world, just like how his siblings and his friends from his own world had abandoned him to this one.

 

Testament to how long Shukaku had been in Gaara’s head, the bijū knew precisely how to get under his skin.

 

Still, once he had confirmed the seal was unchanged and that Shukaku had nothing useful to say, he left. He wished he had the Kyubi inside of him. Apparently the fox just ignored his host.

 

In the end, Gaara had simply performed what little exercise he could inside to pass the time.

 

After he heard someone walking around upstairs, Gaara ventured up. If he wasn’t going to run away, he would have to face them. And better sooner rather than later. If he left them to themselves, he would only be giving them longer to come up with jokes.

 

Sirius’ door was open and his room was empty so he was either in the bathroom or bothering Lupin.

 

Gaara guessed correctly and found them both in Remus’ room, Sirius sat on the edge of the bed and Remus looking like he had been woken up five hours too early. They both turned to him when he stopped at the door.

 

“Uh…” Sirius said, frozen.

 

“You said that already.” Gaara inserted, walking into the room but staying a few feet from the bed.

 

Sirius looked at Gaara for a moment longer before turning to meet Lupin’s eyes. They stared at each other for a second before the both burst out into raucous laughter.

 

Lupin’s was interrupted with coughs and groans.

 

Gaara wasn’t blushing. He wasn’t!

 

After they (finally!) calmed down, and Sirius had wiped the tears from his eyes and Remus had caught his breath, they looked to Gaara again.

 

“You never cease to surprise us all, Gaara.” Lupin started.

 

“He’s right; you always have something up your sleeve. So was that something everybody in your world can do or another one of your special abilities?”

 

“You don’t appear to be an animagus.” Lupin added.

 

“It started when I got to this world. I don’t know anything else.”

 

“I recognised you from the forest. You change on the full moon, don’t you?” Lupin said, remembering the familiar animal from his own transformations.

 

“Did you get bitten by a were-squirrel, Lily?” Sirius asked, excited.

 

Gaara obviously didn’t appreciate either part of that question. “It isn’t a squirrel. It is a tanuki. And I wasn’t bitten, it just happened.”

 

“A tanuki?”

 

“They’re a type of small animal that live in Japan, if I’m not mistaken. A sort of magical raccoon, I think.” Remus said. “But they didn’t look anything like you, Gaara.”

 

“You don’t look much like a regular wolf, Moony.”

 

“I suppose you have a point.”

 

“So, Lily, I remember seeing you on the full moon when you first arrived and you didn’t have a tail or fur, so…”

 

“It started in October and has been consistent since.”

 

“And you say this doesn’t happen to people in your own world?” Lupin checked.

 

“No.”

 

“Well, regardless, I think it’s brilliant. You were starting to get a little boring, I think Remus will agree. It’s been about two weeks since you did something inexplicable so it was past due for you to turn into something. Though, for what it’s worth, I would have put my money on something bigger with more claws and teeth.”

 

“Does Draco know?” Remus asked.

 

“Yes. He found out a couple months ago.”

 

“Hold on. You said you started… this, whatever it is, last year.”

 

“Yes.”

 

“Then how did you manage to keep it a secret from Malfoy junior so long? Was it a case of the mute leading the blind?” Sirius said. He knew Draco wasn’t necessarily a bad kid (being the scion of an ancient bigoted family himself), but he couldn’t resist the chance to take a shot at a Malfoy.

 

“He’s not very observant.” Gaara said. He didn’t want to admit to knocking Draco out multiple times.

 

“So you’re just like an adorable little version of Moony then. You have your own furry little problem.” Sirius said.

 

Gaara didn’t rise to the bait. There were few things more embarrassing than actually arguing that one wasn’t ‘adorable’. “One that I wish to solve. I want you to teach me to be an animagus.”

 

“An animagus?” Sirius parroted.

 

“He wants to learn how to transform so that he might be able to control his monthly changes consciously. I’ve heard of a couple of werewolves who tried it. None of them managed it, but it is a rare gift so it could have been a coincidence. I never bothered, myself. I spend enough time with fur and a tail each month.”

 

“Worth a try, though, right?” Sirius said.

 

“For Lily, perhaps. His transformation is clearly different from my own so it might work. Other than the obvious form difference, he also changes a different point in the moonrise and moonset to me.”

 

“So it’s worth a shot?” Sirius asked.

 

“I don’t see why not. He should be able to find out whether he’s capable in a month or two.”

 

“Quicker than that! James and I managed it that quickly but Lily has an experienced teacher helping him. He should get that far in a couple weeks.”

 

“Maybe, but Gaara’s not… well, he doesn’t pick up on magic as quickly as you or James did.” Remus was trying hard to tactfully convey how inept Gaara was at spellcasting.

 

“I’m sorry, Remus, if your teaching methods failed to help our poor, precious, little Lily in his schooling,” Suddenly Sirius was surrounded by enemies, “but I plan to relate to _my_ students my own way.”

 

“Yes, I can see it now: Professor Sirius Black.” Remus added, sardonically. “Hold on, I think I hear the floo in the other room, it must be Dumbledore looking to fill my old job.” The aching lycanthrope didn’t bother pantomiming getting out of his bed.

 

Gaara wasn’t too enthused by the thought of being taught by Sirius, especially on this most disagreeable of subjects, but he couldn’t deny the utility of the experienced instructor at hand. Nonetheless he knew it was going to be an unpleasant experience.

 

As Gaara began to contemplate the excruciating experience that was soon to start, Remus and Sirius had moved onto another vitally important subject.

 

“Well we can’t keep calling him Lily anymore; it defies precedent.” Sirius argued.

 

“I understand that, Padfoot, but he’s been Lily for so long now, surely it’s too late to rename him now.”

 

“Now is the perfect time. You saw him earlier, he’s perfect. So many features.”

 

“Well, what do you suggest?”

 

“Something to do with his tail?” Sirius started, fingers stoking his beard in thought.

 

“Or his mask perhaps?” Lupin continued, joining Sirius with his own deep-thinking face and twirling his moustache.

 

“It would be a shame to ignore his fur. It looked awfully soft…”

 

“I know what you mean. ‘Fluffy’ something?”

 

“Fuzzy McFluffikins!” Sirius said triumphantly, looking over to see what Gaara thought only to find the redhead already walking out the door. “We’ll keep working on it!” He called after the subject of the discussion.

 

Over the next couple of days, Gaara had to endure Sirius and Remus’ endless suggestions for nicknames, as if Gaara wanted any part of the process. Granted, he was admittedly a tad eager to be rid of ‘Lily’, but when the alternatives were names like: ‘Gaara Fluffy Tail’ and ‘Raccoon Squirrel’, any eagerness died.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

“Domino?”

 

“Zorro?”

 

“Burglar?”

 

“I quite like Burglar. ‘Masked Burglar’, perhaps?” Remus queried.

 

“Too long. Should be one word.” Sirius replied.

 

Over the days the adults had been seriously considering their childish mission, Gaara had been working on his own again. Evidently Sirius wasn’t going to offer any assistance until he had found a new nickname for Gaara.

 

He had briefly thought about resigning himself to helping the pair to speed up the process, until they started on the more insulting names.

 

Then, one afternoon, they both appeared in the library where they seldom ventured since Gaara arrived, and Remus stepped forward with a smile to rival Sirius’ own.

 

“Bandit.” He said, smile stretching impossibly wider.

 

Gaara quickly worked out that this was the result of their exhaustive search. He weighed it up in his head and decided it wasn’t the worst one they had come up with. To be called a mere bandit wasn’t great, but at least it wasn’t a reference to how ‘plush and cuddly’ his tanuki form was.

 

Although he might have liked it if the reference, to his ringed eyes, were not present in his human form as well. At least Padfoot, Moony and Prongs were just eccentric titles with no meaning to any outsiders who heard them. People might put together that ‘Bandit’ was a reference to Gaara’s insomnia/possessions marks in his human form.

 

Then again, it was still infinitely better than ‘Lily’.

 

Over the next two weeks, Gaara started on the excruciating journey that was learning from Sirius Black. It had been frustrating to discover that since he had begun this secondary research project, he had been reading the wrong books and trying the wrong rituals; including the precious days he wasted whilst the two idiots had been deciding his useless title.

 

Sirius said Gaara would have been finishing Hogwarts by the time he managed to transform if he had stuck at his old avenue of enquiry. Both the depth of his folly and the idea that he would still be in this world in four years time were upsetting.

 

Over that fortnight, Sirius had also been continuing his frequent letters to Harry. Of course, now that he was teaching Gaara, he was put in the awkward position of having to lie to his precious godson. He couldn’t admit to teaching Gaara how to be an animagus without giving some sort of reason, and Gaara would surely kill him if he did spill the beans to anyone, especially Harry.

 

In the end, he couldn’t outright lie to Harry so he just cut out any references he might make in his letters to the research. Which pretty much entirely excluded Gaara from the missives, which Harry wasn’t about to complain about.

 

Aside from his messages to and from Harry, Sirius also received two owls from unlikely sources. They had come a couple days apart, but were otherwise entirely unrelated except for one other factor: they concerned Gaara.

 

Sirius had gotten a number of letters asking about Gaara or requesting interviews with the boy, from the papers and the general public. Sirius thought these people were rather resourceful to try and go through the boy’s legal guardian and to find out their address. Still, he had ignored or declined every such letter, just as he was sure Gaara was likely ignoring any such letters addressed directly to him.

 

The two letters he got were set apart because of who they were from: Luna Lovegood and Lucius Malfoy.

 

Luna had politely asked if she could visit sometime in early August, and whether she might be able to do a short interview for the Quibbler with Sirius. Apparently she hadn’t bothered asking Gaara for the visit as he wasn’t very agreeable or social. Sirius heartily agreed to both of her requests. He wouldn’t tell Gaara about it. It would be a nice surprise.

 

Really, Sirius thought it was cute and wouldn’t stand in the way of budding romance.

 

It had taken one unrelated conversation after that thought to dissuade Sirius of any notions of Gaara participating in a relationship. Him having friends was difficult enough to believe.

 

Lucius’ bloviating letter had been a formality Sirius had expected for a while now. It spent four pages (front and back) to ask if Narcissa, Draco and he could visit for tea, and then offered a number of dates they were available. Before it had gotten to the point, it had offered a number of insincere well wishes and claimed that they had all known Sirius was innocent from the start.

 

Sirius bitterly thought that if they had known, they had kept it awfully quiet. And the only reason Lucius would have known Sirius was innocent was because Lucius really _was_ part of Voldemort’s inner circle.

 

As much as he might have liked to outright refuse the pompous man’s request, he understood it was a necessity that they all meet before Draco could come and visit on his own. He remembered having to bring his mother and father to the Potters house after first year for the same reason, even though they all knew each other.

 

Hell, the Potters were, albeit distantly, related to the Blacks and had attended a number of functions together before then. Nonetheless it had been startling to have Orion and Walburga sat across from Fleamont and Euphemia like that. At least Regulus had shut up. He’d been so annoying back then.

 

It had been during that meeting that Sirius realised he wanted James’ family more than his own.

 

Even though he knew he couldn’t reject Lucius proposed tea, he still filled his short reply with as many snarky comments as he could, as well as mentioning once or twice that Sirius’ family was older and purer than Lucius’. He figured the sit down would be unpleasant but would provide many more such opportunities to insult the prig. The only other downside would be that his cousin was going to be there.

 

No matter that she was the youngest of her sisters, Narcissa had always been the most severe of the three, none of which liked him. She never had time for Sirius’ shenanigans or his ideas and made those feelings perfectly clear. Then there had been that period when his mother and father had been threatening to marry him to Cissy. He’d thrown such a fit eventually they had called the whole thing off and she had been married to Lucius.

 

Speaking of cousins who hated him, Sirius thought he should try and reconnect with Andromeda. He had occasionally exchanged screams with Bellatrix in Azkaban but he had not seen Andy in years. Unlike the other two, her dislike of Sirius had not been chiefly because of his blood treachery since she was even more of a traitor, marrying Ted and all; instead, she had simply hated him for his personality. He took comfort in that.

 

Sirius _did_ tell Gaara about this letter, if only so he could drill him on some basic etiquette. If Sirius wanted to maintain the upper hand during the meeting, he couldn’t have his snotty cousin-in-law pointing out Gaara’s lack of manners.

 

So now the first week in August was set to be entertaining.

 

But before then he had Harry’s visit to look forward to.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Sirius was annoyingly up-beat in the run-up to Harry’s first visit, to Gaara’s consternation. The man had spent the better part of two days cleaning and attempting to decorate a room for Harry. It wasn’t enough for Harry to sleep in a guest room, he needed a room of his own when he came to visit, apparently. Gaara didn’t understand that, but then he didn’t fully understand the custody agreement Sirius had struck for Gaara over Harry.

 

The redhead suspected that his guardian was hiding the truth of the matter for some reason. It was clearly untoward, the reason Harry couldn’t stay for more than two weeks during the summer and why Remus had to return to his own place for the duration of those visits. No matter, Gaara thought; there was no sense in asking questions that would produce no answers and only serve to cause his friend stress. Sirius wasn’t the type to bow to pressure and wouldn’t have kept it a secret without a good reason, so Gaara trusted him.

 

For the moment.

 

When Sirius went out to collect Harry, with an assurance that he wouldn’t be long, Gaara swiftly ran to the kitchen, collected a handful of bottled drinks and different long-lasting foods, and deposited them in his bedroom before darting back to the library to snatch up a dozen interesting, thick books. He wouldn’t be able to outlast Potter’s stay, but he would avoid it for as long as possible and skip the first few days at least.

 

Sirius would come and break the door down eventually, so Gaara would enjoy his peace and isolation until then.

 

The Dursleys had not invited Sirius in for tea, rather, they had insisted the man take their nephew/cousin and leave immediately before a neighbour saw him: a long-haired, bearded hippy, looking like a vagrant, and knocking on their door. As it was, if someone mentioned seeing him, they were going to have to lie and say he was a social worker or some such. It was bad enough they had a freak for a nephew, they wouldn’t admit any personal connection to another one of them.

 

Harry didn’t lament the short farewell.

 

When they apparated to Grimmauld Place, Harry was pleasantly surprised by what he saw. With the multiple warnings Sirius had sent him in his letters about the state of the Black family abode, Harry had been worried Sirius had chosen the Shrieking Shack this past year for its resemblance to home.

 

Harry thought it was funny that his relatives considered wizards like him vagrants, and yet here he was staying in a posh London townhouse with the equivalent of a wizarding aristocrat (not to mention that he went to school in a castle).

 

Harry’s broad smile shrunk when Sirius led him to the grimy property in between 11 and 13. Inside it smelled of mothballs, dust and damp, and the décor matched the scent. It had been cleaned since Gaara’s arrival, some weeks before, but Kreacher had only managed so much on his own, and realistically the house needed to be redecorated before some of the worst and most steadfast stains could be concealed or removed.

 

Still, as Harry walked behind his godfather’s scrawny back, he considered the dirt a small price to pay to stay with family. He might even see about helping Sirius’ house elf do some cleaning while he was here. He wouldn’t want to be seen as a layabout.

 

Sirius forced himself to give Harry the tour he had failed to offer Gaara, which was a little easier now that some of the clutter and reminders had been removed. He had to remember to tell Harry which rooms he couldn’t go into on their tour. In one of the rooms sat the stuffed heads of the previous elves that had served his family, which he had finally taken down last week. It wouldn’t be good if Harry found those by accident.

 

As they came to the library, Sirius ducked his head in first to check that Gaara wasn’t in one of his moods, but the redhead wasn’t in there. He scarcely left that one room so immediately the scruffy man worried Gaara had figured out the ruse and had left the property to avoid Harry.

 

Instead, he discovered Gaara’s bedroom door was locked.

 

“Oh, I don’t think Gaara wants to come out and say hello, Harry. He is such a shy boy, you know!” Sirius loudly declared outside of the door, for Gaara’s benefit more than Harry’s.

 

Harry didn’t say so but he was glad Gaara had hidden himself away like this. He had not been looking forward to seeing him, let alone sharing his godfather’s attention with the contemptible Slytherin.

 

Harry knew he would end up exploring the house more thoroughly on his own and would probably check inside the dangerous and forbidden rooms along the way. Compared to Hogwarts, he couldn’t imagine anything Sirius was keeping around the place was all that deadly.

 

For one, there obviously wasn’t enough room for a giant three-headed dog.

 

After the tour, they both settled down in the kitchen for a cup of tea and they talked about the beginning of their summers, although almost every detail had already been enumerated in one of their many letters during that period. The host also introduced Kreacher and explained the protocol for dealing with the foul servant. Harry wasn’t so sure about the treatment of the house elf, comparing it to how he saw Dobby treated, but then he heard the things Kreacher was saying about them and knew the mad old thing was as far from Dobby as any house elf could be.

 

“Oh, and be careful in the hallway by the door. Behind those curtains hangs a particularly foul portrait of my mother. Raises all sorts of holy hell whenever she’s disturbed so it’s best to tiptoe past.”

 

“Okay.” Harry said, taking another sip of his sweetened tea. He was only recently allowed tea at the Durselys, and never with milk or sugar in it. He had discovered the wonders of tea at school and like all good Englishmen, fallen in love with it. Although, Sirius didn’t really have sugar, he sweetened his tea with honey, which worked just as well.

 

“Remus really wished he could be here but he’s still looking for another job. About time too, bloody sponging werewolf, eating my coffee and drinking my food every day…” Sirius said, scowling comically.

 

Harry laughed. It felt god to laugh openly again.

 

“And I’m also sorry about Gaara. He’ll come down at some point, I’m sure.” Sirius said, hoping to inspire some amiability between the two warring teens. Perhaps one of the foreigner’s more endearing idiosyncrasies would alleviate some of the tension.

 

“It’s been very peculiar having him here this summer. You’ll see that this week, too, I suppose. He hardly ever leaves the library. He really missed his bookish calling in Slytherin. He’s not once tried to poison me since he arrived so I think maybe he was mis-placed.”

 

“Not yet, anyway.” Harry added.

 

Sirius laughed but noticed the bitterness in Harry’s tone. His treasured but temporary guest probably thought Gaara _would_ try it.

 

Sirius tried describing some of the other peculiarities but gave up when it failed to lighten Harry’s mood. It looked like the two would simply hate each other for the time being. Lupin would have a better shot at mediating, really. Sirius had always specialised in creating strife, not neutralising it.

 

Harry noticed the subject was winding down thanks to his lacking interest in discussing Sirius’ other teenage dependent, but his mind recalled a question he had been holding for a long while now regarding the mysterious and irritating exchange student.

 

“You know I had the Map that you and my father and Professor Lupin made, last year, right?” Harry started, his eyes darting around to make sure the redhead hadn’t decided to show up.

 

“Yes…?”

 

“I don’t know if Professor Lupin mentioned it-”

 

“Harry, I’m sure Remus wouldn’t mind if you dispensed with the titles now that he’s no longer your teacher.”

 

“Mr Lupin-” Harry started again.

 

“Hahaha. No… just, no, not mister. I’ve got to tell him that one! Call him Remus or sponger or Moony or something.”

 

Harry blushed a little at the ridicule. “Well, I don’t know if _Remus_ told you, but when I saw Gaara’s name on the Map last year, it was a little strange.”

 

“He _is_ a little strange.” Sirius chimed.

 

“With his name, there was a second tag.”

 

“He has a surname?” Sirius’ eyes went a wide. Gaara never ceased surprising.

 

“I’m not sure. Surnames are usually written next to the first name on the same tag but Gaara’s is written on a second under it. I thought he might have a pet but it never leaves or moves. Even when he’s sleeping.”

 

“Is it a long name?”

 

“Not really. It was…” Harry cast his mind back. He had never bothered to write it down since he could just check the Map again if he needed (before it was suddenly confiscated), or Hermione could remind him. “Shu…kakus…? No, it was ‘Shukaku’. Yeah, Shukaku.”

 

“So his name is Gaara Shukaku?”

 

“I don’t know, I was hoping you might be able to tell me.” Either because he knew Gaara or because he knew how the Map worked.

 

“I might know Gaara the best but he’s never mentioned that name to me, I’ll have to ask him about it.” Sirius said, wondering just how many secrets a teenager could feasibly have. Surely it had to end somewhere. “Why have you never asked him?”

 

“I figured there must be a reason he hadn’t told anyone. Like, he was in hiding or something. Plus he’s an arse.”

 

Sirius smile despite himself at that last shot. He thought it was very kind of Harry to consider Gaara’s feelings and safety like that, especially in light of their antagonism.

 

“You were probably right. I take it Mr Weasley and Ms Granger know about it too?”

 

“Yeah. Hermione was the one who noticed the difference from other surnames.” Ron was the one who suggested Gaara was in hiding, but he was sure Gaara was hiding from some foreign Aurors or something like that. Ron liked to make up theories.

 

“Well, I’m sure they wouldn’t go around telling everyone about the Map so just leave it with me. You might have found a fault with the Map for all I know.”

 

“Professor Lupin said the Map never lies.” Harry said, lapsing back into is formal address of his former teacher.

 

“True. But Gaara has a way of confounding everyone.”

 

Sirius planned to ask Gaara after Harry had left, since there were large parts of Gaara’s secretive life that were best discussed in private. He suspected this would be yet another such one.

 

He would also have to ask Remus about it since he had confiscated the Map from Harry and should have seen the same thing. Why had he failed to mention it, though?

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

It was a few days later, the day after Sirius had finally decided to force Gaara out of his room (since he was tired of hearing the shower running at four in the morning), that Harry first heard the name Bandit.

 

Gaara had said hello and stopped at that when first seeing Harry. Perhaps it was the Englishman in him but Harry found it very uncomfortable not pretending to be civil with his sworn enemy until they did something to upset him. Instead, impressively, Gaara forewent custom and stuck to their antagonism.

 

It was a touch awkward so Harry went along with it and treated Gaara in the same regard.

 

Harry’s first thought regarding Gaara, before the hostilities had begun, had been that the redhead was tiny. Granted, he had never been tall but after a month of not seeing him, the difference in their heights seemed even more pronounced. Rather than a fourth year, Gaara looked like he was about big enough to join third year. He refrained from saying as much.

 

Sirius had had such high hopes of reconciliation after he saw Harry trying to bury the hatchet and at least pretend to get along with Gaara. Then Gaara totally ignored the olive branch and continued his casual hostility to Harry.

 

Sigh. Nevermind.

 

Dinners with Harry so far had been lively affairs, with many stories of past misadventures and future plans. Dinners with Gaara typically also featured Remus and they also were filled with laughter and discussion. Even Gaara joined in on the conversations, if not the laughter, when it was just him and the two adults.

 

Dinner with Harry AND Gaara was not so boisterous. Sirius tried multiple times to initiate some sort of conversation but got little in the way of a response. Gaara could be standoffish at the best of times, and after being snubbed, Harry was perfectly content to follow suit.

 

Eventually, to fill the silence and perchance lighten the collective mood, the host tried suggesting a trip to visit Lupin in a couple days. In his excitement, he let slip that Moony wanted Bandit to see his considerably smaller collection of books.

 

Gaara had not been happy to hear his nickname disclosed to someone outside of the two idiots that had devised it, although he was certainly glad of the change from Lily now more than ever.

 

Harry was also less than happy to hear that not only had Gaara usurped his place in his godfather’s home, he had also been given a nickname like a Marauder. He briefly considered that the other Marauder names had been devised from their animal forms and that Gaara didn’t have one, but was more caught up in the immediate sense of betrayal.

 

Sirius, hyper aware of his wards’ discomfort had been watching their reactions constantly to see if anything produced a smile or if anything he said was likely going to cause one to lunge over the table at the other. So, he saw when Harry’s face turned sour at his mention of Gaara seeing Remus’ books. It took him a moment to work out why Harry had been upset, and then his mood plummeted to match the others.

 

Obviously Harry was feeling left out.

 

That night, after Gaara had walked out of the room so that Kreacher could clear the table (and with no intention of returning any time soon), Sirius tried once again to apologise for the situation.

 

He dearly wished he could explain it in full.

 

The best he could do was provide Harry with some happy memories during the short periods they could see one another; and part of that was giving Harry a nickname. It went against convention to do so without an animal form to base it off, but the Marauders, lazy lot that they had been in school, had never bothered writing down any bylaws. Plus Gaara had been Lily for the better part of year before they knew about the fluffiness.

 

“Prongslet?” Harry repeated, less than impressed.

 

“Well, it was either that, after your father, or you can be named after your mother. She didn’t care for her nickname either, much. But if you really want, you can be ‘ _Little_ Miss Bossy Boots.” That joke had led to the first time Lily had sent a curse at James’ head.

 

It certainly hadn’t been the last.

 

“Prongslet’s fine.” Harry said, now worried his mischievous godfather would want to use a mocking female title instead.

 

“Good.” Sirius said, throwing his arm around Harry’s shoulders. “Now, I have to say, from what I have heard of your school performance so far, I am not impressed.”

 

Harry was suddenly worried. Was he not doing well enough in his classes? He thought he had been doing pretty well, all things considered. Certainly above average but below Hermione and most Ravenclaws. Maybe Sirius saw that as a failure? He had never had a relative take an interest in his grades before so maybe he had been coasting along…

 

“I mean, sure you’ve snuck around a fair bit, but where have the pranks been?” Sirius said, the same stern expression set on his face that only seemed to surface in times of jest. “Those Weasleys have been running amuck for years without a challenger. I hope you understand that your nickname means you’re unofficially part of the Marauders now. You have a legacy to live up to.”

 

“Unofficially?” Harry didn’t really think there was anything official about his father’s group of friends.

 

“Well, there’s an initiation, but it involves a werewolf and a squeaky toy, as well as a particularly long stint in detention resulting from a prank. I think it would be best for everyone concerned if we held off on that for a couple years.”

 

“Yeah, sure.” Harry said thinking he could live with being an unofficial member.

 

“There’s a match on soon, we’d best get to the radio or we’ll miss our exalted Minister’s opening remarks.”

 

“I know _I_ never miss a chance to hear him speak.”

 

“And that makes you a fine patriotic wizard, my dear boy.”

 

The radio had been a gift from Orion for Sirius’ tenth birthday, an extravagant gift at the time since it was an entirely frivolous item and promoted the liberal, _progressive_ political elements. It had stayed in his room until Sirius was banished, and then it was moved into Regulus’ room.

 

His little brother had always been jealous of the thing but had never been given one because it was in-part blamed for Sirius being sorted into Gryffindor.

 

Sirius had found it when he first arrived back, along with some others of his possessions. He’d left most where he found them but reclaimed the fully functional radio that now sat in the drawing room.

 

“Ah, good, it’s still in pre-game.”

 

“Who’s playing tonight?”

 

“Nigeria and Senegal. Not the best teams separately, but these two have been competing for years. Or at least they had been the last time I was free for a match.”

 

“I heard Senegal were caught cheating during the last World Cup. Their Seeker was found to be using a magical eye.”

 

“Really? Wow. I’m surprised they were let back so soon. Usually a team gets banned for at least the next three Cups for that sort of thing.”

 

“The rest of the team managed to convince everyone they knew nothing about it. I only heard about it because Ron saved the newspaper clipping with a picture of Senegal’s Captain punching the Seeker so hard the fake eye popped right out. That went some ways to convincing people, I bet.”

 

Sirius roared with laughter. He would have to find a copy of that picture.

 

“I’ve been meaning to ask you something.” Sirius said.

 

“Yes?” Harry reluctantly turned away from the radio. Apparently, despite the excitable radio announcer’s predictions of violence between the rival teams’ fans, both sides were perfectly amiable.

 

“Well, I happen to have a few tickets to the World Cup finals next month and I figured, with you being the youngest Hogwarts Seeker in a century, you might know someone who wanted to go.”

 

Harry gasped. “You’re joking, right?”

 

“Nope, I bought a bunch of tickets. Best seats in the house. We’re gonna be able to accidentally throw our popcorn on Fudge and his cronies all game. There’s going to be camping and singing, barbecuing, and lots of drinking for those old enough.”

 

“Ron’s going to be so jealous!” Harry said, imagining the delights of his first professional Quidditch match, and international finals as well!

 

“Maybe; I _am_ an amazing person to sit next to. But as far as the rest goes, I don’t think he has much to envy. I happened to notice a particularly large block of seats in our box had been bought by the Weasley family months ago when they first went on sale.”

 

“Wait, so Ron’s whole family are going and he never mentioned it?” Harry wasn’t too much of an adult to admit he was a little hurt by this.

 

“That doesn’t sound like something a friend of yours would do. Owl him tomorrow and see what he says. There’s a decent chance he didn’t even know.”

 

That actually made a lot of sense to Harry. Mr Weasley must have used whatever was left of his lottery winnings to buy so many tickets to such a nice box; he was probably waiting until closer to the event to spring it on the family.

 

For the rest of the radio game Harry was even more excited than a good match usually made him. He really couldn’t wait to go and see everybody together and to watch the game live, and to be camping…

 

Harry wondered if this was how most children felt about Christmas.

 

After the match had concluded with a stunning victory for the Nigerian side, it was already quite late and Sirius wanted to visit the zoo with Harry in the morning so they started to turn in.

 

“Oh, and Harry?” Sirius said as they were parting on the landing.

 

“Yeah?”

 

“It’s probably best if you don’t mention the tickets to Gaara. I’ll tell him later.”

 

Harry agreed but honestly couldn’t imagine a conversation between himself and Gaara that would lead to that sort of discussion. It was difficult to imagine any conversation with the surly redhead, beyond an exchange of insults.

 

Meanwhile Sirius was considering when it would be best to tell Harry and Gaara that Gaara was going too. Neither would be happy about it. Probably best to wait until closer to the date.

 

Probably.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Gaara had been enjoying his solitude for the most part. With Harry there, Sirius had been too busy to bother Gaara, and Remus had been banished, so Gaara was allowed to spend all of his time researching and practicing his meditations for the first element of the animagus transformation. Both of the adults in his life told him he would have an enormous advantage in this stage thanks to his propensity for silent contemplation.

 

Gaara was more concerned about the fact he needed to ‘quiet his thoughts’, according to Sirius. Did that mean he needed to relax and stop thinking, or did that mean his mind needed to actually _be_ quiet? One meant he just needed to do what he could already do; the other meant he needed to get the giant demon within to shut up for the first time in fifteen years.

 

Over the course of Harry’s stay, Sirius tried to spend some time with Gaara every day so that he didn’t feel left out, no matter how much Gaara shunned such attention. Still, Sirius was more than used to the curmudgeonly teen’s evasions so he persevered. Plus, Gaara was receptive to specific assistance. He might avoid socialising or _chatting_ , but when Sirius wanted to discuss a pertinent matter or share some insight into his research, he was very agreeable.

 

In light of the tickets Sirius had showed him, Harry was buzzing for days, despite Sirius occasionally darting off to spend an hour or two with Gaara, and despite the fact that the redheaded shut-in would apparently be joining them at the World Cup. He had seen Gaara at a few Quidditch matches at school but his attendance had apparently mostly been a cover for Sirius sneaking onto the grounds or in order to watch Malfoy. Harry told himself Gaara probably wouldn’t even go to the match, or if he did he would sit at the back, probably with a book or something.

 

However, the excitement over the World Cup finals eventually faded to a pleasant memory and Harry was left with the most annoying housemate conceivable. They spent little time in proximity, mostly passing each other in the expansive house’s halls or during meals, but such meetings were always tense.

 

Gaara thought Harry was immature and overly reactionary, and Harry… well, Harry thought a lot of unflattering things about Gaara too, some of which were not as factual as he liked to believe.

 

It wasn’t a big thing that set Harry off. Gaara couldn’t pinpoint the cause of the argument days after the fact when he had time to break it all down in his head. He had been walking back to the library with a glass of water when he had spotted Harry coming in the opposite direction. Normally whenever they crossed paths like this, they would say hello, nod heads, give some indication that they had seen each other, (and always avoid eye contact). It was the smallest courtesy but it was the best either could do.

 

Gaara walked right on past Harry and failed to acknowledge Harry’s magnanimous “Evening.” That was it.

 

Instead, Gaara had been dwelling on a new magical array for his quest to find his home world and had totally ignored Harry’s greeting. Harry had unfortunately not known about the important equations being run in Gaara’s head at that very moment and took this as a total dismissal. And it just rubbed him wrong.

 

“You’re an arse!” Harry hissed, unsure whether to keep walking and leave it at that or wait for a response.

 

Gaara paused and looked back at Harry, staring at him for a few seconds too long. It was just as the Boy-Who-Lived was starting to wonder if he had been unduly combative like Hermione was always scolding him for being, when he finally got a response.

 

“You’re a child. I am busy.”

 

“What?! _I’m_ the child?!”

 

“I’m busy.” Gaara’s monotone repetition didn’t effectively convey that he didn’t want to stand around slinging insults like Harry might have liked. If Gaara wanted to fight, it wouldn’t be using words; but he did not want to fight Sirius’ godson again, he wanted to get back to his work.

 

“No, you listen!” Harry yelled, “Sirius is _my_ godfather and here _you_ are living here with him while I have to live with my aunt and uncle, and they both hate me. When I don’t have a snake obsessed megalomaniac who killed my parents trying to kill me, I have you messing up my life. Why are you even here?!”

 

Obviously Harry had a few things to get off of his chest.

 

“I was invited.” Gaara realised he was in an argument, but he wasn’t at all emotionally invested in it so the best he could do was just wait until Harry started a fight or something.

 

Gaara didn’t credit the other teen with the ability to upset him enough to start the violence.

 

“You weren’t invited! Sirius just feels sorry for you because you’re a weird mute foreigner who wears too much eyeliner, who everyone’s afraid of.”

 

Now Gaara did take offence. He did **not** wear eyeliner, no matter how many people accused him of it.

 

“We’re quite similar, you and I.” Gaara said, thinking of how a snake maniac had killed _his_ father (a debatable title to attribute to the Kazekage), and how an uncle had ‘hated’ him.

 

“How are _we_ similar?” Harry refused to think they had anything in common except that they were both (presumably) orphans.

 

“We both know loneliness. And our families hated us.”

 

Harry hadn’t expected that, but he couldn’t deny it made sense for someone like Gaara to come from an unhappy household.

 

“I was forced to kill my uncle when I was a child to protect myself.” Gaara didn’t like this sort of disclosure but the animosity between them had to stop or else it would just be Sirius that would suffer. They didn’t need to be friends, but if he and Harry could sit through a meal with their guardian, it would be an improvement.

 

And besides that, Gaara had never made any effort to understand Harry or help the bespectacled boy understand him.

 

The admission of murder, even in self-defence caught Harry off guard. Surely when Gaara had said “child” he meant when he was eleven or twelve. Like how old Harry had been when he had killed Quirrel. Professor Dumbledore had gone to great lengths to explain that Quirrel had already been long dead and his body had just still be walking around with a corrupted soul, but Harry had nightmares all through that summer.

 

“How old… how old were you?”

 

Unless he was like Harry and had somehow been blamed all his life for something he did as a baby, the Boy-Who-Lived considered.

 

“Around six.” Gaara answered.

 

That was the best he could remember. His previous birthday had been a long while before the attack, but he didn’t know if Yashamaru had stopped celebrating them in those final months or if the attack had just come before the next. After his uncle had died, there had been no one to celebrate Gaara being alive so he had started keeping track later in life by the cycle of the seasons and a throwaway comment by the Kazekage about how old he was when he graduated the Academy formally.

 

Harry was stunned into silence, a rare occurrence.

 

“Six? You were six?” Harry just had to repeat it aloud.

 

“I think. I may have been seven.” Gaara understood that this clarification wasn’t helpful, but as before, he was still hopeless at these sorts of conversations.

 

The wind had effectively been taken out of Harry’s sails and any impulse he might have held to accost Gaara was gone. As soon as he took a moment to stop hating Gaara and regard him in an unbiased light, it was incredibly difficult to go right back to despising him. He was at least six inches shorter than Harry and just as skinny, and seemed to be constantly perplexed by what people did around him.

 

In other words, Harry pitied the little psycho too much to hate him. He knew it wouldn’t last long, but it was still frustrating.

 

Gaara still wasn’t interested so he proceeded to the library, hoping his disclosure would suffice to shut up the temporary house guest until he left again. He had run out things to say anyway, and it was usually about this time in conversations that he tended to say the wrong thing.

 

Best to quit while he seemed to be ahead.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

“Happy birthday!” Ron yelled as Harry walked into the dining room that morning.

 

The Boy-Who-Lived paused in shock, reached up and plucked the glasses off his face, gave them a clean on his night shirt, and the replaced them to double-check he had indeed seen a Weasley at Sirius’ table.

 

“Happy birthday, Harry.” Sirius said, rather more sedately, as he sipped his coffee.

 

Ron had been invited to spend the day at Grimmauld Place, as had Hermione, who was due to arrive via floo in an hour. Apparently she had notions of acceptable times to visit a person. Notions Ron did not share. He had been there for twenty minutes already.

 

Once Hermione arrived, and after five minutes of clearing the ash from her hair, the reunited trio had caught up at length and explored the house. It had come as a shock when Hermione strode right into the library only to see Gaara’s tired eyes peering up at her from the floor, clearly having not expected the intrusion.

 

Ron followed closely with Harry who had thought Gaara was in his room.

 

“Oh, hello Gaara. How are you?” Hermione amicably said.

 

“I am fine.” Gaara didn’t turn back to his book quite yet, but nor did he ask the polite follow-up reciprocal question.

 

“Well, it’s nice to see you again, and I hope you can come down and join us later.” She was far too friendly, Ron thought. The ginger didn’t say a word, instead he just glowered at Gaara like always.

 

Harry was still reeling from their frank discussion the other day, but had come to quietly dislike Gaara again after their following encounter, so he swiftly and politely beckoned his friends to leave Gaara in peace and they left without further ado.

 

Gaara would not show his face downstairs willingly but Harry didn’t plan to tell Hermione that. If the insomniac was smart, he would find somewhere to hide before she came looking for him.

 

Sirius had insisted that he be allowed to throw a party for his godson so Harry had simply requested that it be a small affair. Knowing Sirius, if he hadn’t stipulated that, the head of the Black family would have rented a hall and invited everyone.

 

Literally everyone.

 

So, in accordance with the birthday boy’s wishes, Ron and Hermione were spending the day and in the evening the rest of the resident Weasley’s were coming over, and so were Neville, Seamus, Dean, and Professor Lupin. Mrs Weasley had demanded that she be allowed to cook, which both Sirius and Harry had wanted to object to since there would be over a dozen mouths to feed, but she wouldn’t take no for an answer. She even threatened to visit more often to bring Sirius back up to a healthy weight.

 

Then she had started off on Harry still being as skinny as a rake and that Gaara was clearly malnourished and would never grow unless he got some wholesome meals in him. Sirius had tried to explain that they did eat at Grimmauld Place, since they had an angry house elf preparing the food for them, but Molly didn’t care.

 

In all, as the day progressed and his reunion with his two best friends turned into a full party with most of the precious people to him attending, Harry thought this was the best birthday he had ever had, and possibly the best he was likely to ever have.

 

Ron had been ecstatic to hear that Harry was going to the World Cup, explaining that he had been planning to invite Harry with his family as they had an extra ticket. Hermione would also be attending and now, with the spare ticket, Mrs Weasley was being dragged along.

 

Hermione, as much as she enjoyed the sport, had to work hard to change the topic before her entire day descended into her listening to her two companions heatedly discuss Quidditch.

 

 _Boys_!

 

Remus had showed up after lunch, having been assured by Sirius that his presence would be permissible due to it being a large gathering rather than a more intimate visit. Less chance of the big bad wolf corrupting the saviour.

 

By mid afternoon, most of the rest of the Weasley clan had flooed in, including Mr and Mrs Weasley, the twins, Percy and Ginny. The twins were probably even more excited than Ron to be there, in the home of their idol (and Gaara!), and had proceeded to try and pull Sirius or Remus away to discuss their future prank and business plans at every opportunity.

 

Remus was less agreeable than Sirius to it. Lupin liked to pretend that he was too grown up for pranks and such these days.

 

Sirius was not, though he couldn’t spend too long talking to the funny pair as he was supposed to be hosting. If he left for too long, Molly seemed to end up shouldering the burden of keeping order.

 

Eventually with so many people in the house, Hermione took pity on Ginny and tried to spend a while talking to the only other girl there. Otherwise the poor younger girl ended up standing with her parents all day.

 

Percy was perfectly content to stay with the adults, although he seemed to have a bit of a small bladder as every time a certain known werewolf came near, he seemed to have to make a speedy exit, presumably to the bathroom. Molly, all-knowing mother that she was, scowled each and every time.

 

Mrs Weasley disappeared for a while and only after she returned did they discover that she had gone to find Gaara and ended up chatting with him all that time. She had been delighted to hear him speak, albeit sparingly, and had gone to uncomfortable lengths to express her gratitude for Gaara’s protecting her children from the dementors.

 

During the course of the party, a number ascended to ‘check on’ Gaara and invite him to join the festivities downstairs. First had been Molly, then Hermione had taken her turn. She was most insistent despite Ron and Harry having warned her not to waste her time and the other younger guests all shooting her fearful looks when she announced her intentions.

 

Then came Sirius who was actually going up to make sure Gaara was okay and wasn’t in need of any food or drink. Sirius had long since disabused himself of the notion that Gaara _needed_ social interactions like other (“normal”) people, but he still felt the compulsion to offer the boy something from the party.

 

The Weasley Twins hunted him down after that, having claimed they were going up to the bathroom (no one wanted to question why they were both going together), and bugged him until he threatened them in a similar manner to Kreacher and they backed off. Later in the day, they covertly asked Sirius if they could return another day to chat (and try bugging Gaara) again.

 

Lupin tried last, but like Sirius he was actually gauging how Gaara was doing rather than trying to entice him. In his mind, it simply didn’t make sense that a teenager would shun a party and hide in a library reading magical theory texts so dull even Remus wouldn’t have touched them in school.

 

Each time somebody conspicuously disappeared up the stairs to talk to the household recluse, Harry watched warily, hoping they would come back alone. He might not hate Gaara as much as before, maybe even pity him now, but the guy was still as much of a buzz-kill as he ever was.

 

Speaking of buzz-kills, Hermione had demanded to know how much if any of his and Ron’s homework had been finished already. Ron lied and said he had done it all, but Harry foresaw Hermione’s scepticism and said he had only done about a third. He had done none so far. Hermione believed Harry and accused Ron of lying and having done nothing.

 

The look of betrayal Ron shot Harry as Hermione whacked him on the arm was priceless.

 

After the lecture from their bookish friend had finished, they moved onto their predictions for the year ahead.

 

“Well, first year a teacher was trying to kill you, then in second a big snake, a book and Ginny were trying to kill you,” Ron said, ignoring the indignant yell from his little sister who overheard him, “and then last year an escaped lunatic and some dementors came after you.” Ron ignored the indignant yell from Sirius this time, mostly because he had been mimicking Ginny. Ron tended to speak loudly. “I think this year Gaara’s gonna take a crack at you. Or maybe it’s finally Snape’s turn.”

 

“Ron, that’s not fair.” Hermione told him off.

 

“I don’t know, Herm. I think I’ll be lucky to make it through the rest of my visit without Gaara coming for me.” Harry said fondly. Seeing the look on Hermione’s face he added, “Even Sirius says Gaara’s only a bad joke away from killing him, and Gaara actually likes him.”

 

Hermione harrumphed.

 

They talked more about their assignments as well as their class picks. Hermione managed to steer them off the topic of Gryffindor’s Quidditch chances next year, she had had enough sport talk already this afternoon.

 

Dinner was no less impressive than any home cooked feast Molly had prepared and by the time the stuffed revellers were pushing back their chairs from the table to make more room for their bloated bellies, the group were sighing contentedly and a number were wondering if they might just snooze where they sat. The obvious exception being Mrs Weasley who had been getting up to serve all during the meal, even telling a livid Kreacher to leave it to her.

 

She had also piled a plate high and run it up to Gaara, after asking Kreacher to do that one task and his display of great discomfort bordering on refusal had convinced her to just do it herself. The redhead had tried to complain that it was too much food but she said he was being silly.

 

It was Seamus who piped up that it was time for Harry to open his presents.

 

It was awkward for Harry to have to open his presents in front of a crowd eagerly watching his every move but he persevered.

 

First came Seamus’ gift, which he had jumped up and retrieved when his suggestion was taken. Under the colourful muggle wrapping paper was a brand new Nintendo Game Boy and a handful of games.

 

“They don’t work at Hogwarts, mind you, but you can use it when you’re at home.” He said, very proud of himself. His mother, a witch, had been all for getting the saviour of the wizarding world an expensive gift when Seamus received his invite so she bought a ‘handheld gaming device’ like the one Seamus had gotten last year, following Seamus’ suggestion.

 

Harry was very impressed, having seen Dudley get one a couple years ago and spending months staring at it. He had cast it off soon after that, being stuck on every one of his many games and deciding it was broken. It had been far too fancy and expensive for Harry to sneak away so it had been left to gather dust until it was thrown away to make room for another abandoned toy.

 

Mr Weasley, of course, fell in love with the thing immediately and had all sorts of technical and nonsensical questions for Seamus about its operation that he was unable to answer.

 

The Weasleys brought the usual assortment of gifts, none of which were expensive or fancy, but all quite thoughtful.

 

Dean had likewise been thriftier than the Irishman, buying Harry a new pair of broom riding gloves. They weren’t as nice as his current pair had been, but those were getting old and the holes were getting bigger, so they would still be an improvement.

 

Hermione had blushed when she presented a present from her parents: an electric toothbrush, which she said they insisted he should have. Apparently she had tried to explain that electricity did not work in their school but they would not take no for an answer and insisted that every young man should care about their dental hygiene. If it were not a gift, Harry would have given it to Arthur, who had moved on from the confusing muggle toy and onto the vibrating tooth cleaning device.

 

“Delightful!” He declared in the corner, jotting down notes in his little notebook with an equally little pencil. Molly scowled but didn’t pull him back just yet, otherwise her husband would spend the rest o the day pouting that he had not been able to fully examine the fascinating muggle technologies.

 

Hermione had also gotten him a book, which he thanked her for. He wondered which he would get more enjoyment out of, the book or the toothbrush.

 

Ron muttered something similar so she slapped him upside the head when nobody was watching.

 

After blowing up Marge, threatening Vernon with his wand, and then returning with threats of a mass-murdering godfather this summer, the Dursleys didn’t even bother sending a sarcastic card with a pound coin in it. Harry didn’t consider it much of a loss.

 

Finally it came to Sirius and Remus’ gifts.

 

Remus had gotten him a couple interesting books, including one about werewolves (making a few in the room blanch at the reminder of their lycanthropic co-guest); one about animagi (which covered a lot of the more general material Gaara had been reading about over the course of several different tomes); and a curious, worn book of essays on the obscure subject of ‘transcendental charm work’.

 

Harry wrinkled his nose at the last book, unable to discern what the theoretical book was actually about by the complicated blurb. It was the sort of thing he saw Gaara reading in the library all the time. He would have to have Hermione translate it into lay terms later so he could work out why Professor Lupin thought this dry book was a suitable present.

 

Noticing the predictably dissatisfied expression on Harry’s face, Remus leaned forward and softly said, “Look at the contents page, Harry.”

 

Harry opened the cracked leather cover, wondering why, again. It was definitely an older book, well used, and on an entirely uninteresting subject. The contents read as a series of even more complicated and specific essay titles. Harry had even less of an idea of what the point was until he came to the last one, ‘(Dec 1978), ‘Fields of Emotional Subjectivity in the Expression of Charms Arrays’ by Evans, Lily – pp.541-612’.

 

“Wait, is that…?”

 

“Yes, your mother. While James, Sirius and I went on holiday to Australia after finishing Hogwarts, your mother had already begun researching a theory she had suggested in her final year. James thought she was crazy. It didn’t help that he managed to get a job as soon as he got back while Lily was still working away on her thesis. Although he got fired after four months and just lived off his parents’ money in the end.” Remus said, staring fondly at the book in Harry’s hands. “She spent months cooped away in libraries and their study. They were already engaged by this point, you see, but she refused to marry your father until she finished.”

 

“James was convinced she was trying to blow him off after the second time she tried explaining her work to him and he didn’t understand. He thought she was making it up so he would stop letting Euphemia make wedding plans.” Sirius said.

 

“Euphemia?” Harry asked.

 

“Your grandmother on your father’s side. She passed on during the war.” Sirius said sadly, both at the death of the kindly woman and because Harry was fifteen by the time he first heard her name. He would have to tell Harry all about them as well.

 

“Anyway, she finally finished in November and was published almost immediately. She’s the youngest witch in that book by thirty years. It really is no exaggeration to say she was the brightest witch of her age.” Remus continued. The room was silent, although Hermione had tears in her eyes and Harry was fighting against following suit.

 

“I wanted to give you this book at Christmas, but I couldn’t find a copy anywhere. It wasn’t a best seller.”

 

“Where did you find it in the end, Professor?” Harry looked up at him.

 

Lupin had given up trying to get the children to stop referring to him as ‘Professor’, so he let it slide. “This was my copy. She gave copies to all four of us. I think James’ went up in flames during that… that night. And Sirius’ sadly exploded due an unexpected duel in his flat about three months after she gave it to him.”

 

“A duel?” Ron piped up. He was surely imagining some heroic battle with Death Eaters or other dark wizards.

 

“Well, duel is a bit-” Sirius started.

 

“He got drunk at a bar and invited a nice young witch home with him. She took offence to something he said and tried to blow him up. Instead she took out his sparse bookshelf.” Lupin smiled.

 

“She was nuts!”

 

“Sirius!” Molly admonished.

 

“She was! And then I got kicked out of the flat and had to sleep on Remus’ sofa for two weeks.”

 

“Because Lily wouldn’t let James invite you to stay on theirs. And it wasn’t two weeks, it was closer to two months.” Remus said bitterly.

 

“Rubbish.”

 

“I know it wasn’t two weeks because I wouldn’t have had to replace my sofa otherwise.”

 

“You kept your place way too hot. I was shedding.”

 

Remus was rubbing his closed eyes, trying to stave off the headache he got every time they discussed this.

 

“Stop arguing you two, poor Harry hasn’t finished opening his presents.” Molly, ever the motherly presence, put a prompt stop to their argument and got the party back on track.

 

“I wanted to get you a car but Remus said I shouldn’t. So blame him for that.” Sirius said petulantly.

 

“He’s only fifteen!” Remus said angrily.

 

“You can’t give him a car, Sirius. You should have seen what he and Ron did to my Anglia a couple years back. In fact, _I_ wouldn’t mind seeing what they did to it.” Arthur said, still angry that he had never seen his car again. Worse still, Molly wouldn’t let him get another one.

 

“It’s not nearly as exciting as a car or a new broom, but I think this should last a lifetime.” Sirius said, suddenly nervous that his gift was insufficient. Maybe he should have gone with his second impulse and bought Harry some property.

 

It was huge, needing Sirius to levitate it in through the door. It had been sloppily wrapped, assuredly by the ex-convicts own hands, in moving Quidditch wrapping paper. Harry carefully removed it so he could keep the paper. He didn’t know how long the enchantments would last, but he would definitely put some of it up on his wall here.

 

Later, after he left, it would be joined with half a dozen moving Quidditch posters that Sirius practically covered the walls in. It was disorientating but a considerate thought.

 

Sirius had given Harry a brand new trunk for school, which would have been far too mundane so he had sent off for the fanciest trunk his family’s money could buy. It was stylish, lightweight for the owner only, secure, and enlarged on the inside so much it functioned as a series of rooms. It would be perfect for when, like all fine young gentlemen should, Harry went travelling after his schooling. Until then, it would perhaps give the boy some space away from his dastardly relatives when he returned.

 

Harry was amazed when he discovered the steps into his trunk. Remus said he had gone overboard and that Harry didn’t even have enough possessions to fill it, so Sirius had rebutted that he would just buy Harry enough things to fill it.

 

He didn’t mention it, but Sirius had also bought Gaara one such trunk, feeling bad that Harry had gotten such a fancy gift while Gaara had been given a dead rabbit on his birthday. He told himself it was a retrospective gift and left it at that. He was planning on waiting until Harry had left before giving it to the reclusive foreigner.

 

He had to steel himself, ready for the total lack of appreciation the redhead was likely to respond with.

 

The party went on for a few more hours into the evening but too soon all the guests started going home.

 

Arthur had declared it was time to go back to the Burrow when he saw George and Fred skulking towards the drinks cabinet. Ron didn’t want to leave, but thankfully Molly pulled him into the fireplace by the ear. It was impressive because she had both of the twins’ ears in her other hand. Sirius was glad for her help because he didn’t want to have to admit that he would probably get in trouble with the Ministry if he allowed anybody else to stay the night when Harry was there.

 

Remus and Hermione were the last to leave after Dean had been picked up by his mum. They lived in London so it had been easier for him than Hermione who lived further afield. Lupin had offered to drop her off via apparition. He planned to go back to his place afterwards and drink alone… heavily.

 

That night, when things had gone silent downstairs, Gaara had appeared to bring his plate down, having eaten only a quarter of the tasty food on it. It was a shame to waste food like this, but when he looked to put some of it in the fridge, he found mounds of leftovers already sitting in there.

 

Molly had outdone herself.

 

As midnight passed, Gaara considered that he had been able to give Harry the gift of not seeing him all day successfully. In fact, since Harry was leaving the next day, unless Sirius was determined to make it otherwise, Gaara might not have to see or interact with Harry until his next planned visit.

 

Sadly, the next morning Sirius demanded Gaara come down for lunch and to say good bye to Harry. That was exactly what he said before turning right back around and going back to his room, not waiting for Harry’s response, if any.

 

Harry had come to expect something like this so he didn’t let it bother him. Instead he focussed on how funny it was and on Sirius, rather the impending separation from his world. Going back to the Dursleys had not been this difficult for him since… well, since he got off the train a month ago, and before that his first train ride back there.

 

Truth be told, it was never easy to go back there, but now it felt like there was a choice and he was being taken to the worse option.

 

Still, it was just one more month to go until he went back to Hogwarts, and was to be broken up by a few more visits with Sirius and of course the Quidditch World Cup.

 

He had made strides in his relationship with Gaara, no longer glaring every time he saw the tiny redhead, but a little part of him still existed that took solace in knowing that Gaara wasn’t living the highlife Harry had imagined before this visit.

 

When Harry was with his relatives, he was locked in a small room with only books for comfort, and Gaara voluntarily did that in Sirius’ massive, welcoming house.

 

While Sirius was keeping a stiff upper lip, Harry was making no effort to hide his heartbreak as he was dropped off at the end of Privet Drive. What Harry did not know was that Sirius was concealing his feelings as much as he could, otherwise he would be openly bawling and looking for someone to punch. Instead his eyes watered at last and he hugged Harry and sent him on his way after reaffirming when they would next see each other.

 

When Sirius got back, he looked for his quill so he could send an owl right away. A couple days later, after he had calmed down a little, he broached the topic of Gaara’s mysterious surname with the boy.

 

“Gaara, does the name ‘Shukaku’ mean anything to you?” Sirius asked, expecting a dismissal or a simple truth. Instead, he watched as Gaara’s eyes went wide. The foreign boy had an exceptional poker face most of the time but when his mask cracked it was glaringly obvious.

 

“Where did you hear that?”

 

“A magical map listed it with your name. We thought it must be your last name.”

 

“We? Who else knows?”

 

“Me, Remus, Harry, Ron and Hermione. Oh, and possibly the Weasley twins.” Sirius counted them off in his head.

 

“It’s not my name. It doesn’t matter.”

 

Sirius stared Gaara for a moment or two, wondering if this was an issue he should press. It was clearly a sore subject, but would it help to pry or just make matters worse?

 

“I can see it on your face; it does matter. What or who is Shukaku?”

 

“It’s not something you need to know about. Ever. Don’t mention him again.” Gaara muttered and walked away.

 

Sirius thought Gaara was storming off in anger, instead Gaara was leaving so that Sirius didn’t see his fear. He had not known magic would be able to sense Shukaku inside of him, or certainly not that it would be able to identify and _name_ the beast.

 

Of all people, Gaara did not want Sirius to know about Shukaku. The darkness in his soul, both the demon and the resulting evils committed in his childhood, were not something any rational man could forgive or abide. Gaara did not ever want to suffer his friend’s unavoidable scorn, and to keep that happening he could never reveal the truth of Shukaku. Not unless there was a dire need.

 

Sirius, thinking he had terribly upset his ward, resolved to never bring up the uncomfortable subject ever again.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Luckily for the pair, Remus showed up soon after, having finished his latest bender and wanting some company. Gaara and Sirius had suffered under an awkward air since the brief but frank incident, so the buffer was appreciated. It might be said to have been appreciated more by Sirius than Gaara who had simply gone back to holing himself up in the library, though he had emerged to say hello when the werewolf arrived. Things went back to normal as soon as Lupin settled in, it seemed.

 

Then, soon after that, it was time for the Malfoys to come over for tea. Knowing that Lucius and Naricssa would never deign to use a bathroom in his house, Sirius only had to ensure that the drawing room was neat and tidy for their arrival. They would floo in, have tea, politely refuse any suggestion they stay for dinner, and then leave through the same fireplace again. If he offered to show them around the house, they would accept, but no such invitation would be extended.

 

By the time Lucius stepped through the fire into the room, the drawing room had been cleaned so thoroughly and entirely it was almost as if Orion was going to walk in any minute and give Sirius a beating for inviting friends over without asking permission. When Gaara was back at school, Sirius planned to have some decorators come and renovate the place. Make it unrecognisable.

 

Sirius had been pretending to read at that moment, acting a tad startled when Lucius flamed through, as if he had forgotten all about the Malfoys’ visit. The feigned nonchalance was aimed at bothering Lucius, but Sirius wasn’t rewarded with any reaction. He quickly got up so that he could look the platinum-blond in eye. Any notion that these two men were anything close to friends would have died quickly when they saw the sneers set onto their faces.

 

“Lucius.”

 

“Sirius.”

 

“Welcome to my home. Please, come in.” Sirius beckoned the man to one of the plush chairs he had purchased just for the occasion. The moth-bitten ones that had stood there for the last thirty years would have only served to make Sirius look lesser. It wasn’t that he was trying to impress Lucius, only ever belittle him.

 

The fire flared and out came Narcissa, not a speck of ash sticking to her fine dress.

 

“Narcissa.”

 

“Cousin.” She replied in what appeared to be a cold manner; except her reference to their familial bond implied a small measure of warmth. Sirius didn’t notice this concession as his mind had conjured the image of his older cousin calling him names and ganging up on him with her sisters.

 

Narcissa waited by the fireplace until Draco stumbled through. He kept his footing, as was expected of him, but he did it with considerably less grace than his parents had.

 

“Hello, Mr Black.” Draco greeted.

 

“Draco, nice to see you again.” Sirius smiled a little. He didn’t have any real opinion of Draco beyond his comforting friendship with Sirius’ ward, but it would irk Lucius if he pretended to like Draco. “I’m terribly sorry but Gaara was in the middle of studying. You know how boys can be. Studying all day.”

 

Narcissa pursed her lips in an almost-smile at the dig. She would let that one slide, but if Sirius tried to score points at Draco’s expense again, she would come off the sidelines and join Lucius in ripping Sirius a new one.

 

In the politest way possible, of course.

 

“Kreacher!” Sirius bellowed.

 

The house elf popped into existence but withheld any mutterings he might otherwise have liked to give since Sirius had ordered him not to speak unless spoken to today and to remain on his best behaviour. Normally this would have resulted in him disparaging Sirius as usual since that was the best he could be, but when he recognised who was standing in the drawing room, he couldn’t possible say anything rude.

 

“Master,” He bowed, and then to Narcissa, “it is the highest honour to be in the presence of the young mistress again.” He then bowed to Lucius and Draco in turn but with less grovelling.

 

Narcissa remembered the elf but didn’t deign to respond. It was still a servant, no matter how long it had been hanging around the Black family.

 

“Go and fetch Master Gaara, now.” Sirius commanded, again inviting the Malfoys to sit.

 

Accommodating Kreacher’s fearful aversion of Gaara was difficult at times like these so Sirius had told Gaara to be ready to come to the drawing room when he heard a knock on his door, and when he gave Kreacher his earlier standing order he also told him to just knock on Gaara’s door to summon him.

 

Quicker than Sirius would have thought possible, Gaara let himself into the lounging room. He was dressed in some smart robes that Sirius had bought specially. That had been another tricky affair since getting Gaara to accompany him out of the house was difficult enough, but to get him to go clothes shopping was impossible. Even persuading the stubborn boy to let him take some measurements so he could send away for clothes had required a bribe.

 

Sirius had to promise to take Gaara to a blacksmith; the boy wanted some throwing knives or something. As irresponsible as Sirius was (proudly so), he did think twice about buying a teenage boy bladed weapons, but since Gaara was a formidable fighter with or without the knives, he figured he might as well.

 

Draco looked on at Gaara and had the same impression Potter had, that Gaara was really quite short now. Gaara meanwhile was thinking that Draco looked awful. His hair was impeccable, his robes immaculate, if sporting a few splotches of ash near his feet, and his posture was better than ever; and yet his skin was waxy, his eyes had bags under them (though no one was going to accuse him of using make-up any time soon), and his reactions were sluggish.

 

“Good afternoon.” Gaara greeted them simply. Sirius had mentioned something about shaking and kissing hands but he wasn’t going to do that, and bowing in this culture was seen as servile so he settled for staying still and waiting for them to respond.

 

“Gaara.” Lucius evenly said.

 

“It’s lovely to see you again, Gaara. You are looking well. I’m glad we can finally talk properly.” Narcissa added.

 

Unable to determine if she was being sincere, Gaara nodded his head. Sirius smirked at that but quelled it.

 

“Hello, Gaara.” Draco’s voice sounded rough.

 

Gaara thought back to his teachings from Temari and the additional manners Sirius had tried to instil, and said nothing. His first impulse had been to say ‘You look awful, Draco.’

 

They all sat down at last and started on the small talk. Sirius droned on about the troubles of organising his financial resources and getting his estates back into order (both of which he had actually been neglecting). Lucius countered with how his job at the Ministry was particularly fulfilling at the moment as were all of the social events of the past year.

 

Narcissa stayed out of the sniping, mostly consigning herself to chatting softly with Gaara and trying to get Draco to join in. Draco, for his part, was playing the role of the dutiful heir, keeping quiet and not branching out into any real conversation.

 

Sirius had warned Gaara that the meeting would be boring and unsocial. It wasn’t so the boys could meet up, but so that the families could formally establish ties. Once the redhead understood it was a purely political function he had made his peace with it, but seeing Draco as he was now was worrying.

 

The tensions Draco had mentioned in his letters had obviously been the cause to no end of stress for the ideologically changed snob. Lucius’ temper was not to be taken lightly, and it had not escaped the man’s notice that his son’s recent changes were set against his long held beliefs.

 

Gaara did not see any bruises on Draco, but if he had he might have gone about this meeting with much less civility. By the end, Lucius likely would not have been able to drink tea.

 

Gaara tried to follow Sirius and Lucius’ conversation out of the corner of his eye, but without devoting his entire attention to what the two men were saying, he was pretty sure he was missing some key parts of the dialogue. He was not very skilled at detecting subtext and doing so while also paying attention to Narcissa was impossible.

 

Draco only spoke up a handful of times during the entire tea, adding details about trips, agreeing with his mother, things of that nature.

 

Gaara was also not very good at small talk, so it was a real challenge to keep chatting away with the middle-aged woman and his friend. It came as a relief when she allowed the conversation to lapse so she could turn and attend to her husband and cousin’s escalating hostility. She interposed herself before the snarky comments could build to a physical confrontation.

 

Knowing her cousin as she thought she did, Sirius would probably leap over the table at her husband before any wands could be drawn. She loved Lucius as much as she considered appropriate but she honestly doubted he would win in a fist fight with Sirius, even as diminished the man was after his time in prison.

 

Luckily, Sirius was clearly still intimidated by her and so was quick to back off when she diverted the conversation away from their previous posturing.

 

Briefly she was able to inspire some camaraderie when she brought up the upcoming World Cup. It wasn’t entirely suitable tea time talk, but it did get them talking about something they both liked. For all of three minutes.

 

Once they had moved past their both going to the match and the teams’ chances against each other, Lucius couldn’t help but mention all the games he had been to in the last decade, and then Sirius had to bring up Lucius’ poor performances in his schooldays on the House team. From there they had gone back to their antagonism.

 

The tea was drunk and just in time too, Narcissa thought as she interrupted her husband’s crass remark about prison food.

 

The visit had been formal and any benefit Gaara might have gained from the socialising had been negated by the atmosphere.

 

“Well, thank you so much for stopping by, Lucius, Cissy. Draco, you really must visit Gaara again soon.”

 

“Yes, well, he has so many commitments…” Lucius drawled, pretending to consider the offer at length. “I’m sure we can schedule something. And, of course, Gaara is welcome to return to Malfoy Manor any time.”

 

“Thank you.” Gaara said.

 

“Yes, thank you. I’m sure Gaara would love to come by again. I just hope he has the time with how busy he has been lately.” Sirius bemoaned, parodying Lucius’ faked consideration. Realistically, Sirius had precious little control over Gaara’s movements like that. He wasn’t much of a guardian in that sense, he bitterly noted.

 

Lucius and Narcissa were all smiles as they walked into the drawing room fireplace, Draco followed, but after his parents had disappeared in flames, he turned and said, “Sorry about all of this. I’ve got to go, I’ll see you soon.”

 

Draco couldn’t keep his mother and father waiting so he left as well.

 

Sirius watched until the flames died down and then immediately flopped back into his chair, all of his previous poise and posture long gone. He called out for Kreacher to get him whiskey. Not wishing to come between the man and his hard-earned drink, Gaara left to his room.

 

He didn’t feel like reading right now. He was going to go and train in his room. He couldn’t do much but he could keep his body in shape and his mind unfocussed.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

The next letter he had received from Draco, the day following the Malfoy visit, spelled out another apology for the usually talkative blond’s demeanour. He played off his disaffect as being an expression of etiquette. He did, however, note a desire to visit soon on his own so they could ‘hang out’, which Gaara hoped included watching him reading for hours upon hours. Otherwise Draco was going to be sorely disappointed.

 

Upon prompting (read: nagging) from Sirius, Gaara replied immediately to the letter with an invitation to stay over. Technically Sirius was supposed to extend the invitations to the house but he would send an owl to Lucius later with the offer. It was a blatant afterthought but he could manage only so many formalities in one week.

 

At least he had gotten his troublesome reunion with Narcissa over and done with already. Now he just had to contact Andromeda and he would be golden.

 

Perhaps in the Autumn…

 

It did not occur to the lifelong rebel that no matter how much he claimed to have rejected his parent’s teachings, he still held many of their values close to himself even now. For instance, that no matter how much one might hate their family, one had a duty to remain united with them.

 

How true that might still hold if Bellatrix were free and present was debatable.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

“Good morning, Gaara.”

 

Gaara’s eyes shot open and he stopped drinking his glass of milk. He at last sighed. “Hello, Luna.”

 

Sirius snickered from behind his bacon sandwich. He had been worried Gaara would stay shut up in his room all day and Sirius would have to lure him out somehow so that Luna was not kept waiting. Luckily Gaara had taken to drinking milk every day for some reason after Harry and Draco’s visits, so he was fairly regular with his emergences.

 

“Luna stopped by for a visit, Gaara.”

 

“I see that. Thank you for notifying me in advance.” Gaara was not skilled in detecting sarcasm or judging when to use it, but this seemed like as good a time as any.

 

“I hope I’m not disturbing you, Gaara.”

 

“It’s fine. I needed to take a break from my research.” Gaara lied unconvincingly, sitting across the table from his friend.

 

“How has your animagus project been going?” She asked.

 

“Well. Sirius has been helping me.” Gaara could not remember if he had mentioned that to her in his sparse letters.

 

“Hey, Padfoot, has Gaara come down yet or-” Lupin stopped speaking when he spotted the spiky red across from the shining blonde.

 

Sirius poured the adults some coffees and then pushed Lupin back out the way he came, “We’ll get out of your hair, it’s not every day Gaara has a _girl_ friend visit.” He had made sure to emphasise the space between ‘girl’ and ‘friend’. He planned to make as many insinuations as he could during this visit and afterwards.

 

“Mr Black seems like a lot of fun to be around.” Luna said after he had gone.

 

Gaara did not nod at that.

 

“I’m sorry for surprising you like this. I thought Mr Black would tell you I was coming.” She said, pretending to be apologetic despite her having neglected to tell Gaara in her letters also. She had not wanted to risk tipping him off and having him refuse.

 

They talked for over two hours, mostly with Luna telling Gaara about her father’s latest articles and her short trips to mundane locations that held extraordinary secrets. He added bits here and there, sometimes even branching out into comparisons to his own world when she brought up an interesting subject like magical horticulture or deserts.

 

She was delighted when he shared small anecdotes of living in a sandy desert village. Things like how they stayed sufficiently hydrated around the village without carrying huge amounts of water, and the sorts of animals about the place. He got the impression she had a softer image of Suna life than the reality when she struggled to believe they did not keep pets (with the notable exception of a few prosperous families who knew to keep them out of Gaara’s path).

 

After they had caught up on their comings and goings, Luna insisted on looking at Gaara’s research notes. Ever the Ravenclaw, she seemed uncommonly interested in both of his dry research fields. She also wanted to examine the Black family library, a glint in her glassy eye suggesting she might be asking to borrow “a few” before she left.

 

Gaara sometimes wondered why he had ‘friends’ since he did not like socialising and most of the people he called his friends annoyed him most of the time (especially the ones in his own world), but when Luna spent the better part of four hours poring over his findings and his progress since they last talked, he remembered.

 

She was surprisingly insightful on the subject of animagi, having done a research project of her own (primarily so that she could help Gaara). Their conclusion was that he was still a long way off transforming properly and he would be fortunate to be ready by the end of the holiday.

 

After lunch, which sadly also included Padfoot and Moony, Luna was to be given a short interview with Sirius. Gaara sat in to watch, curiosity compelling him rather than the need to be in the same room as his friend/guest. Lupin had also wanted to stick around but he apparently had to let someone into his flat which Gaara took to mean a repairman or delivery, though Sirius loudly insisted it was probably an estate agent looking to sell the place since the sponger was living with him.

 

He then had to convince Luna, her quill poised above her notebook, that he did support werewolf rights and did not believe they should live on the streets (or ‘in the wild’).

 

The interview was interesting for her and dreadfully dull for Gaara who was wishing he had brought a book with him (a common problem that he would look into solving magically at some point). It lasted less than a full hour and she had scribbled down a lot of notes, making the interviewee visibly sweat.

 

The teenagers sat down to play chess in the afternoon, which Sirius loudly ridiculed. He had been abnormally bothersome today, Gaara thought. For one, he had always been hanging around, as if he suspected they were going to do something (though, _what_ a teenage boy and teenage girl would do together when they were alone escaped the redhead).

 

Plus Sirius kept saying things in an unusual way that he suspected contained some sort of double meaning he wasn’t getting. He drew the line when these intonations started giving Luna a red face. He did not understand what about the question, “Gaara, do you want to sit a little closer to Luna there? She looks cold.” might prompt such a physical response in her, but figuring it was a joke of some sort at her expense, he glared at Sirius.

 

This only made the man chuckle.

 

When evening drew in, Sirius offered to let Luna stay for dinner as well, but she regretfully said her father was expecting her (and her interview notes) back for one of his roasts. She said that she would love for Gaara to visit sometime, and Sirius was welcome to come too since her father would love to meet him. As she was leaving, she asked if Sirius could pass along a request for an interview to Professor Lupin. She and her father wanted to write an article about werewolves living in harmony with witches and wizards.

 

Sirius happily agreed, doubting Moony would want to but feeling safe in extending the offer.

 

Luna said her good byes and gave a little wave before jumping into the fireplace and calling out her home. Gaara did not waste any time in returning to his room to continue his work and to look over the notes he had been taking during their discussion of his work.

 

The article was released the week after Luna’s visit and Sirius had pulled it out at dinner to read to Remus and Gaara.

 

“You should have seen the queue at the newsstand! When the guy running it figured out who I was, he told me this was the best selling edition of the Quibbler he had ever carried. Normally he doesn’t sell all that many and he often has to sell the remainder back to the publisher, but he was going to sell out by noon at the rate they were going.”

 

“What do you expect, Sirius? It’s the first interview you’ve done since you were exonerated. Readers don’t care what paper or magazine it’s in, they just want to read the inside scoop.” Lupin sagely added, sipping his after inner coffee.

 

“‘ _Sirius Black: Life as a Freed Man_ by Luna Lovegood and Xenophillius Lovegood’” He started…

 

‘ _Mr Black sat across the room, his eyes no longer the sunken depths made famous recently by photos taken and distributed after his illegal capture in June. He smiled a lot and made jokes frequently but sobered once we touched upon the subjects for which this article and the larger public interest is based._

_He began by telling the story we have all come to know, in his own words, starting with his heroic and voluntary actions during the war against You-Know-Who, his protection of his friends, Lily and James Potter and their newborn, his godson, Harry Potter, and then to the matter that caused so much pain and trouble. He said that the spell hiding the Potters had required a third party to keep them hidden, a ‘Secret Keeper’, and that as the obvious party he could not fulfil the role. Instead, the least likely to be picked would be, the infamous Mr Pettigrew was selected. The attack of October 31 st 1981 that followed is known to every witch and wizard in the world, now known to be instigated by the treacherous Secret Keeper, Peter Pettigrew. _

_Upon investigation, it transpires that before his trial, Peter Pettigrew was Kissed by one of the dementors of Azkaban and his body moved to the prison to be housed, though the Ministry refuses to specify when or how the dementor escaped their control to dispose of the suspect. They did however reveal a court had since tried him_ in absentia _and found him guilty, he has also been stripped of his Order of Merlin, 2 nd Class. _

_Sirius Black was apprehended whilst seeking justice for his friends and imprisoned without a trial in Azkaban for twelve years. Forgiving man that he is, Mr Black clarified that it was the previous administration that erred and left the mess to be cleaned up by later officials under Minister Fudge._

_There, in the hellish prison, Mr Black languished for over a decade before he made his daring escape to clear his name and protect his beloved godson, the Boy-Who-Lived. What followed, most will have read in other papers during the course of last year, but it has now been revealed that Sirius Black and James Potter’s long-time friend, Remus Lupin, a professor of Hogwarts during the period, had been aiding in Mr Black’s survival and quest and is in this reporter’s opinion no less a hero than Black himself._

_When asked about his life since his release, following one of the most publicised trials since the end of the war, Mr Black revealed he had taken in an orphan ward and was working to rebuild his shattered life and reputation. He was also engaged in reconnecting with his godson and expressed a desire to have Mr Potter come and live with him in the years to come, outside of his schooling at Hogwarts. He even revealed that Mr Potter had joined him at his home for a birthday celebration recently._

_I also asked what, if any, plans he had for the future, to which he spoke with less of his exuberant confidence. Beyond his family and friends he expressed few ambitions, which is understandable when one considers he has only had a scant few months to create a future for himself after a Good Samaritan caught Pettigrew and cleared his name. One thing was made clear in the course of his answer, that Mr Black would not seek employment with the Ministry of Magic. He refused to clarify his exact reasons but with his mistreatment noted in the public domain, it leaves little to the imagination what that disincentive might be._

_Before the end of the interview, I asked what Mr Black felt towards his transgressor, the irredeemable Mr Pettigrew, now that his punishment had been applied (albeit thanks to yet another dementor related mistake). It was a difficult subject for Mr Black to discuss, he confessed, but he expressed no lingering fondness for his childhood friend. He requested that we move on as that was all he had to say on the subject._

_Finally, I asked if Mr Black believed there were other innocent witches and wizards being held in Azkaban Prison like he had been, to which he said it was unlikely. He downplayed the terrible injustice perpetrated against him and explained that his were exceptional circumstances and any failings the previous administration visited upon him were unlikely to have been repeated._

_On a personal note, this reporter found Mr Black to be a man haunted by his experiences and looking to re-establish himself in respectable wizarding society. I am sure most good citizens of Britain would join me in wishing the best of luck in doing so._ ’

It had come as a shock to Sirius and then to Remus to hear what had happened to Peter, but neither man could say they were truly saddened by what they considered to be a fair punishment. After the shock subsided, they were not even surprised, knowing the sorts of tactics Fudge tended to employ to avoid further scandal. It _was_ a tad odd that the Lovegoods, of all people, had been the ones to unearth this latest cover-up.

 

Nonetheless, with his agreement with the Ministry in the back of his mind, Sirius hoped the Minister would not attempt to renege on their deal regarding Gaara’s custody over the inevitable embarrassment this article was sure to cause. He had tried to temper his language and avoid accusing the Ministry of any wrongdoing, but Luna had been dogged in her questions and had presumably been encouraged by her father to emphasise the less than flattering facts about their government.

 

Sirius had asked that any allusions to Gaara specifically be removed or obscured, to give the boy as little attention as possible. Most people had read or heard about Gaara’s actions in the Attack on Hogwarts, despite the Ministry attempting to keep him out of it too, but Sirius still believed it was for the best.

 

Luna had struggled with Mr Black’s request since it seemed unethical to purposefully hide an important fact from a story, but she also could not separate her personal feelings on the matter, and she had to consider the ramifications of further publicising his name…

 

In the end, she had asked her father, who was editing the piece, to keep Gaara out of it, arguing that it had been a stipulation of the interviewee.

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

“I want them shut down!”

 

“I don’t think that’s a good idea, Minister. It will simply give them a louder voice when they come back again and will serve to delegitimize your position.”

 

“Then I want to put out a statement denouncing this rag, their writer, and that troublemaker Black!”

 

“I would not advise that either, Minister. You ought not to lend your voice to their article, which will fade from memory in a matter of days.”

 

“Then their writer-!”

 

“Is a fourteen year old girl, if I’m not mistaken; writing with the help of her father in their home.”

 

“Black and I had a deal!”

 

“Yes, I am well aware of the particulars of that arrangement but unfortunately he did not, to my knowledge, say anything that would be in breach of the agreement. That said, his article was definitely given outside of the spirit of your agreement and a sternly worded letter would suffice, I believe.”

 

“A letter!?”

 

“A reminder of the consequences if he should continue to speak out against you: not only will he not receive the custody of mister Potter, but he will lose mister Gaara’s guardianship as well.”

 

“He will regret this.”

 

“I have no doubt, but for the moment a reprimand will suffice, I think.”

 

“Yes, you’re probably right, Henrick. It was just a poorly written article by a silly little girl; people will forget in a few days. This business about Pettigrew, though…”

 

“I have my department looking into where Mr Lovegood came by his information regarding the… unfortunate incident with Mr Pettigrew. Would you like the perpetrator to be charged with the leak of secure information or simply have him quietly excused?”

 

“Toss the little bugger in a cell. I’ve been getting owls all day demanding the Ministry removes the dementors from Azkaban. _Demanding_!”

 

“Yes, that will be a difficult perception to change, regarding the dementors.”

 

“Exactly! First Black escapes, then when we find him again those bloody things attack the school, then that little freak shows up with _Peter Pettigrew_ back from the dead! And now not only did we ruin Sirius Black’s life, we apparently also mislaid another bloody dementor and it Kissed Pettigrew before his trial!”

 

“Yes, a truly unfortunate accident. My people have investigated the incident and their findings indicate that while an oversight was made, it was nothing more than negligence from an overburdened prison employee. He is now under review and will be relocated to another department pending his acquittal of gross misconduct.”

 

“Another department? That idiot _misplaced_ a dementor and not only is he staying out of Azkaban, he’s keeping his _job_!?”

 

“That will be determined during the course of the investigation, though from preliminary findings that I have been made aware of, I expect he will be found innocent of any crimes beyond a clerical error.”

 

“A clerical error?”

 

“A most unfortunate one, indeed.”

 

“I want to be kept abreast of the review board’s findings, Henrick. Something went wrong here and I am going to be staring down the wolves for this one. I want answers.”

 

“Of course, Minister. I will arrange for the minutes from the hearing to be added to your morning briefing.

 

Fudge sat down at last, his face going back to its starting colour.

 

“Ten galleons says the ruddy Prophet jumps on the bandwagon and decides to comment on this rag.” Cornelius picked the latest Quibbler back up from his desk so he could gesticulate with it some more.

 

“I did not wish to worry you, Minister, but the Daily Prophet has sent their early approval copy to us and it _does_ include several references to the Black article in tomorrow’s edition. They contacted several of our offices for confirmation of the details but I have ordered all press liaisons to deny such requests for the time being. I think it would behove us to wait until you are ready to make a public statement, to avoid any misunderstandings or mixed messages.”

 

“Tell them we do not approve of the article!”

 

“I am afraid they will likely ignore any protests we might lodge unless we can determine a legal standpoint from which to lodge an injunction. Sadly, no such reasons are forthcoming.”

 

“Bloody press!” He smashed his pudgy fist down on his desk heavily, failing to incite a flinch in Morbidus. “Fine! Why don’t we just tell them the earlier report was wrong and Pettigrew was caught trying to escape?”

 

“I would… be wary of making any definitive statements to the papers on the subject. Instead, consider suggesting the possibility and announce, as part of our investigation, that we are looking into reports of an escape attempt.”

 

“Yes, that will do the trick. It will keep them busy for a while at least until we can get this mess sorted.” He sat back in his chair, taking his hat off. “If my venture doesn’t go to plan next year, I am done. You’ll help me, won’t you, Henrick?”

 

“Of course, Minister. I will do everything within my power to ensure you are able to continue governing as smoothly as is possible.”

 

“Thank you, Henrick. Could you send for my speech writer on your way back to your office? I think we will need to get started on that statement.”

 

“Yes, Minister.” Morbidus let himself out of the office and told Fudge’s personal assistant to start making preparations for the press conference.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Sirius was at Lupin’s apartment, helping him to clean up after a nasty potions spill had caused a magic resistant mess when the paper came to Grimmauld Place. Gaara had taken to reading it every week or two to keep up to date with the world he was currently in. He had never made it past the first five pages owing to his total disinterest in current events, but he kept tring.

 

Today, however, he found himself reading page one and then going straight to pages two and three for the whole story, headlined: ‘Pettigrew Kissed, Sirius Black Speaks Out’. The Daily Prophet hardly mentioned Luna’s efforts or her father’s in getting the interview or exposing the cover up surrounding Peter, Gaara was not happy about that.

 

After the relation of Luna’s article and the direct news regarding the rat, the Prophet featured a subsequent article covering a press conference given by Fudge to respond to the accusations made by the Quibbler. The Minister had said very little and spent a long time saying it, but did intimate that Pettigrew might have been trying to escape and that since Sirius’ escape from Azkaban they would have to revise their security policy lest anybody else try to copy him. Essentially he was blaming Sirius for the whole affair.

 

Instead of the reporters agreeing that Sirius was to blame, they had gone ahead and blamed the Ministry for the whole mess instead. There were more suggestions that Fudge should resign, which altogether made Gaara smile. What troubled him was the mention the inept politician made to a spectacular announcement to be made in September.

 

Gaara guessed it was going to be some sort of glorified publicity stunt; he just hoped it would not involve Sirius or himself.

 

OXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXOXO

 

Harry was waiting patiently for Sirius to come back downstairs. It was time for him to return to the Dursleys once again but Sirius had been waiting all day for the owl carrying their World Cup tickets to arrive. His godfather was insisting that Harry be there when they arrived and Harry was not in any rush to get back to Privet Drive.

 

The fireplace flared and for a moment Harry thought it was going to spit out Professor Lupin, who, once again had needed to disappear for the duration of Harry’s stay. He would have thought something was terribly amiss if he had not seen the haggard ex-teacher on his birthday. As it was, he still did not fully believe the string of coincidences that called him away every time Harry came to stay when in the course of Sirius’ regular letters Lupin hardly ever seemed to leave.

 

Out of the fire stumbled, not Remus, but Draco Malfoy. Just about the last person Harry wanted to see, barring perhaps Snape or Voldemort.

 

As the platinum blond rose to his full height ad brushed off the traces of soot from his expensive robes, he noticed someone standing across the room and got an equally unpleasant surprise once he identified the person set to greet him. He had anticipated Gaara or Sirius, certainly not _Potter_.

 

He loosened his instinctual sneer to pass some kind of salutation along since he was in absolutely no mood to get into a pissing match with the Gryffindork, but in that spirit he kept his mouth shut. Draco honestly was not sure he could say two words to Potter without making one of them an insult.

 

Harry was suffering the same predicament, his mood already precarious with his impending departure, so he too keep his mouth shut for fear of starting a fight that would only make him feel worse. Though, as soon as Malfoy mouthed off he was fair game.

 

Sirius practically skipped downstairs with the golden envelope the delivery owl had just handed him waved about in his hand. He was about to loudly proclaim his joyous receipt when he realised the other teenager standing in the room with Harry was not Gaara but the only other young Slytherin with which he was currently acquainted.

 

“Oh, Draco, is it that time already?” He dropped his hand and looked back at the door.

 

As expected, Gaara had appeared like magic just in the nick of time. Gaara, apparently due to his training as a shinobi, was able to walk all through the creaky old house without making a sound, which frustrated Sirius to no end. In this instance, though, he was simply glad of Gaara’s unerring ability to show up any place at any time.

 

Gaara didn’t take any notice of the tense stand off between his friend and Potter, instead saying, “come on.” And leading the way back out of the room.

 

Draco did not care for being summoned like a dog, but he could either stay put in protest with Potter, or he could swallow his pride (a familiar taste by now) and follow Gaara. Needless to say he thought the Black ancestral home was disgusting as he ascended the stairs.

 

Malfoy Manor had been in their family for only about two hundred years, his ancestors having lived an embarrassingly meagre existence before them. Before their rise to prominence, the Malfoys may have been purebloods but they had not been wealthy. Looking around at the current state of the oldest pureblood family in Britain, Draco was given the startling thought that wizarding families could fall as quickly as they rose.

 

“Here they are!” Sirius cheered, resuming his flapping the tickets.

 

Harry pulled on a smile, trying act enthusiastically for his godfather’s sake. It was hard to jump into the excitement when he had just confronted his school rival and was about to be sent back to his borderline abusive relatives because his godfather had chosen a redheaded psychopath over him. All that said, his fakery did not last long when Sirius opened the envelope and pulled out the four tickets.

 

Four tickets?

 

They had moving players flying all over them and each of the tickets featured a different position. One had two pairs of Beaters whacking Bludgers between them, one had players passing a Quaffle from person to person in some intricate play, and then there was…

 

Why four tickets?

 

There was one with a set of hoops being desperately defended by a Seekr, and the last one had two Seekers facing off! They were so cool!

 

Sirius, him, Professor Lupin…?

 

“Those are amazing!” Harry’s split mind was entirely excited now.

 

“Aren’t they?! I think I know which one you’ll be wanting.” Sirius said, handing Harry the Seeker one with a flourish.

 

“Isn’t it a bit early for this?”

 

“I want you to hang onto it.” Sirius thought it was the least he could do, to give Harry a souvenir to remind him that he had not been forgotten.

 

“Why are there four, though? There’s you, me, and Professor Lupin…”

 

“…And Gaara.” Sirius said after taking a deep breath.

 

By this point he had simply been planning to ask Remus to take Gaara while he accompanied Harry, and then they would have just run into each other at the Finals. He was ready to admit it had not been a great plan.

 

“Gaara’s coming? He doesn’t even like Quidditch.” Harry tried to reasonably persuade Sirius that Gaara would be much happier staying at Grimmauld Place on his own. In fact, everybody would be happier that way.

 

“I’m sure he’ll enjoy himself one way or another. Even if the match doesn’t do anything for him, thought I don’t know how it wouldn’t, the parties and camping afterwards are half the fun anyway.”

 

“You’re probably right.” Great, now Gaara was going. At least he would probably sit quietly with a book the whole time. Harry would likely forget he was there, he hoped.

 

“Come on, we’d best get going. We’re running late.”

 

“I wouldn’t worry about it. Aunt Petunia won’t miss me for a few hours.” Or days.

 

“Maybe she wouldn’t,” Sirius said darkly, “But part of the visitation agreement is that I have to get you back on time. Don’t want the kind and generous people of the Ministry getting the panties in a bunch now, do we?”

 

“I suppose.” Harry trudged to the door once again.

 

Upstairs in Gaara’s room, both boys had taken seats to catch up properly.

 

“Sorry about the awkwardness on my last visit. Mother and father can be quite stifling when they chaperone.”

 

“Your culture’s formalities are as baffling as my own.” Gaara conceded.

 

“I can imagine.” Draco nodded, wondering, like others had, what sort of world could have produced Gaara.

 

“Has your father been hitting you?”

 

“What?!” Draco had been reclining in Gaara’s desk chair but snapped upright when Gaara’s casually asked if his father had been beating him.

 

“Of course he hasn’t.” He might have slapped Draco once or twice but it was certainly nothing beyond the scope of parenting. And most definitely not something to be discussed, even with a best friend.

 

“Good. I will kill him if he hurts you.”

 

Now, in Gaara’s mind that was the sort of thing a friend says to comfort a troubled comrade and reaffirm their bond. In Draco’s mind, Gaara was suddenly reminding him of when they first met and his redheaded roommate terrified him. Now that he knew him better, he knew Gaara was trying to show he cared.

 

Draco hoped so.

 

“Thanks, Gaara. Don’t worry about it. Umm… how is your animagus training going?” Draco asked, desperately trying to change the uncomfortable subject.

 

“Well, I believe. Sirius has said I am progressing quickly but he is unsure when I will be able to transform at will.”

 

They hung for the entire afternoon and Draco was to stay for dinner. Lupin hadn’t returned yet so it was just the three of them at the table. Sirius got up to retrieve their plates from the dumbwaiter and set them down on the table himself.

 

“Why does your house elf not carry the plates for you?”

 

“Kreacher doesn’t care much for Gaara. Won’t even be in the same room as him.”

 

“Really? How impudent. I had always heard the Black family elves were particularly loyal. Then again, if Dobby could betray our family, it’s not outside the realm of possibility for yours to become defiant.”

 

“It’s not that, really. He would serve Gaara if I ordered him to, I’m sure, but I would not want to subject Gaara to the foul thing.”

 

Draco was surprised to hear a so-called Light wizard talking about a house elf like that. Even Draco didn’t have that much against them and his had run off. Then again, no matter what Sirius was, he was a pureblood. “What did it do, Gaara?”

 

“It was annoying so I told it to go away.”

 

“You told him a few other things as well, didn’t you, Gaara?” Sirius intoned.

 

Draco thought back to Gaara casually threatening to kill his father, so he did not want to think the boy would say to a lowly house elf.

 

“So, what have you two been chatting about up there? Girls? Quidditch? Pulling one over on old Snivellus?”

 

“Snivellus?” Draco questioned. He wasn’t sure if Sirius was demanding a full report on their discussion (like he was sure to receive at home) or if he was just interested.

 

“Severus Snape, an old chum of mine from school. Next time you see him, you tell him I said hello.”

 

“Okay.” Draco said, having no intention of mentioned the names of either Grimmauld Place resident to his Head of House when term restarted.

 

“Draco said he is going to the Quidditch World Cup.” Gaara said. He preferred not to converse over dinner since it slowed his digestion, but there would be no avoiding it now, so he picked the only of one of the three subjects Sirius mentioned that was applicable: Quidditch. Although, come to think of it, Luna came up once and she was a girl.

 

“Are you now? I bet our father has got you in the nicest seats, am I right?” Sirius had a wide grin on his face.

 

“Yes, we’re going to be sat next to Minister Fudge this year. Last time we had to sit at the back of the box, it was humiliating.”

 

“I don’t know about that, sitting back there you get to throw popcorn on the Minister for Magic. And you don’t have to talk to the man. I would say that privilege is worth paying extra.”

 

Draco laughed but tried to quell it since it was entirely inappropriate to be laughing about such a political topic at the dinner table, doubly so when this was his first proper meeting with Mr Black.

 

It was hard to remember the formalities expected of even an informal dinner like this when Mr Black kept making jokes and teasing Gaara. It went from enjoyable levels to uncomfortable ones and back over the course of the three course meal. Mr Black (who insisted on being called Sirius for fear of being mistaken for his deceased father) was not saying anything truly inappropriate, it was simply his never-ending impertinence that made Draco feel put off.

 

He had been warned Sirius Black was a consummate Gryffindor, but he had still expected a certain level of comportment from a renowned pureblood.

 

Dinner came and went and soon after desert had been finished, Draco started to make his excuses.

 

“Thank you very much for hosting me for the day, Mr Black.”

 

“You’re always welcome, Draco, unless you keep calling me ‘Mr Black’, like I’m some sort of respectable adult.”

 

“Yes, sir…-ius.” Draco stumbled. “It was good to see you Gaara; father says you are welcome to visit after the World Cup finals. I’ll send you the dates he said we’re available.”

 

“Okay.” That was all Gaara said.

 

Draco walked into the fireplace and called out, “Malfoy manor!” And disappeared in flames again.

 

“He looked much better this time around, didn’t he?” Sirius stated.

 

Rhetorical question or no, Gaara grunted in affirmation.

 

“Oh, I almost forgot,” Sirius forced out a laugh, “Gaara, you have to see the tickets I got for the Quidditch World Cup. They’re amazing!”

 

“Congratulations.”

 

“And you said that Draco will be there as well so you’ll have someone to talk to.”

 

“I’m going.” There wasn’t really a question there.

 

“Of course you are, we’ll have a great time: Seeing the best Quidditch in the world, camping, meeting friends, and getting drunk, for me anyway.”

 

“Do I have to go?”

 

“Do you _have to_ go? Do you _have to_? No, of course you don’t _have to_ go, but why wouldn’t you want to go and watch some spectacular sports and see some people for a change.”

 

“I don’t want to go.”

 

“Well, too bad because you’re going. I already dug out the tent. Plenty of room for three.”

 

“Three?”

 

“Harry and Moony are coming too, but Remus has to use his own tent. We used to go with James all the time, but Moony hasn’t been in years. Just wait until you see drunk-Remus; that right there is true magic.”

 

“I’ve see him drunk, on my birthday.”

 

“That’s right! Oh, well, then you know how much of a treat it is. We’ll definitely have him blitzed by the first whistle.” Sirius cackled. Gaara doubted the weekend would have much to do with Quidditch, and even still he didn’t like the sound of it.

 

“If you’re good, maybe I’ll let you have a sip of some Fire Whisky.” Sirius was enamoured with the thought of a drunken Gaara and was determined to make it a reality one of these days. Some might call it irresponsible to plot to get a fifteen year old drunk, but each and every one of those same people would undoubtedly call Sirius an irresponsible man, so who cared what they thought.

 

The only obstacles were Gaara’s level head, and Moony’s better judgement, the latter of which would be swiftly neutralised with the proper application of inebriation and subtle reasoning.

 

It was going to be one hell of a World Cup; enough to make up for a decade of missed opportunities.

 

In a few years, he would delight in getting Harry drunk too, but until then he was too afraid of Lily somehow cursing him from beyond the grave for encouraging her precious child to underage drink. If anyone could manage it, she could. So Harry would have to be the responsible, sober one.

 

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Omake:

Gaara was glad for his voice coming back only occasionally. Since its return he had been expected to talk a lot more, but with it back he had access to the floo network without having to cling onto an able-throated accompanying witch or wizard. So, with this small measure of freedom from his captivity at Grimmauld Place, he had decided to take a short trip somewhere he might otherwise not want his guardian(s) to know about or accompany him to.

 

“Hog’s Head Inn.” He said, throwing the floo powder into the flames and stepping in. It was his first time using the fireplace without supervision and his aversion to all magical form of travel was flaring up, so he stepped gingerly into the hearth until he was sure he wasn’t being burned.

 

When he tumbled out of the other end, he was met with the amused expression of the proprietor who was cleaning tables; the man did not pay him much mind otherwise. Gaara tried to recall the man’s name but the only one that came to mind was Dumbledore and that was the headmaster, so he supposed he must have forgotten. He offered a dignified nod of greeting after he got up from the floor and then walked straight outside.

 

It was a very sunny day but Hogsmeade was a quiet village when there weren’t dozens of teenagers running around so Gaara was able to walk at his leisure to the edge of the village and into the forest.

 

He had walked nearly a mile into the massive woodland when he heard a familiar thumping through the forest floor.

 

Gaara had planned to spend a relaxing summer’s day in the woods training his claimed dog but he had failed to account for the fact that Fluffy was a dog who loved Gaara and who had not seen Gaara in over a month. Gaara’s did not know how excitable dogs could get when their masters returned from extended absences.

 

When he arrived back that evening, Sirius had been panicking and wondering how long he should wait before hiring a bounty hunter to track down his missing ward, when Gaara flew out of the fireplace, covered in a nasty mixture of ashes and what looked like saliva.

 

Sirius opened his mouth to berate the reckless teenage boy and question his current state but when he caught the look on Gaara’s face he thought twice about it. He would try again later.

 

Three days later, after many tries, Sirius finally asked Gaara what happened and was told, “I went for a walk.”

 

Sirius then whined to Lupin all evening about how terrible a parent he was.

 

Remus was entirely unsympathetic, telling him, “You’re not a parent, Padfoot.” Thank Merlin.

 

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Omake 2:

During Luna’s interview with Sirius which Gaara had been obligated to sit through (he was not supposed to abandon his friends when they visited), the redhead had sat scribbling something on a pad of paper. Luna had asked what he was writing but Gaara had told her it was nothing and she accepted that. Sirius had pushed the issue, curiosity burning at him, until Gaara finally admitted that he had been drawing a picture.

 

That had stunned Sirius. He had never considered that Gaara might be artistic, but knowing how proficient he was in almost everything he did (barring magic), Sirius wanted to see what the boy had sketched.

 

Gaara was quick enough to tell his guardian that he had been sketching his siblings from memory but steadfastly denied any further request to see the picture. He would not budge.

 

Sirius was determined to see the product so he started a campaign over the next few days (with more determination than he had showed when trying to ascertain where the fifteen year old had sneaked off to without telling him) that primarily consisted of giving Gaara not a moment’s peace until he caved. It was not just Gaara’s drawing skills that Sirius wanted to see, he was also very interested in seeing what Gaara’s siblings looked like. He knew a few details about them including the genders and names, but he was curious about their appearances.

 

In his mind they were an older girl-Gaara and an older boy-Gaara. The mental image of three Gaaras was… unsettling.

 

Gaara eventually relented because he did not want to kill Sirius (the only other solution, he devised) and because he was a great artist. Yashamaru had told him he was a prodigious artist when he was younger and that if being a shinobi didn’t work out, he could make a living from his art.

 

Turned out that Yashamaru had been telling the truth, Gaara was a good artist… for a six year old. His uncle had looked upon the crayon scribbles fondly back then and proclaimed them to be masterpieces, if only to see Gaara smile.

 

Sirius looked down at the stick figures roughly sketched and scribbled and started to sweat. From the look of cool confidence on Gaara’s face, apparently no one had ever told him he drew like a young child. It was at that moment that Padfoot stumbled upon the age-old secret discovered in every major shinobi village on Gaara’s home world: if a Jinchūriki hands you a cherished drawing, you should avoid insulting their efforts.

 

The Sandaime Hokage had suffered to learn that lesson.

 

“Oh, wow. You weren’t kidding. You really are good at drawing.” Sirius said, trying to make out the individual characters Gaara had been trying to depict.

 

Gaara did not need to smile. He knew how good he was, he did not need people praising him.

 

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There is a sequel called Hidden Inhumanity which you will find on my profile. I hope you enjoyed the first installment of this series.


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